When Harry Met Tom
by The Carnivorous Muffin
Summary: When the battle in the department of mysteries heads south, Harry finds herself flung backwards in time to 1942, where Tom Riddle is a prefect in his fifth year. Armed with this knowledge, but little else, Harry desperately tries to find a way home and for once in her life not screw it up. Tom, for his own part, wonders when Harry Evans will head back to the mothership. fem!Harry
1. Chapter 1

" _You realize of course that we could never be friends."_

" _Why not?"_

" _What I'm saying is – and this is not a come-on in any way, shape, or form – is that men and women can't be friends because the sex part always gets in the way."_

" _That's not true. I have a number of men friends and there is no sex involved."_

" _No, you don't."_

" _Yes, I do."_

" _No, you don't."_

" _Yes, I do."_

" _You only think you do."_

" _You say I'm having sex with these men without my knowledge?"_

" _No, what I'm saying is they all want to have sex with you."_

" _They do not."_

" _Do too."_

" _They do not."_

" _Do too."_

" _How do you know?"_

" _Because no man can be friends with a woman that he finds attractive. He always wants to have sex with her."_

" _So, you're saying that a man can be friends with a woman he finds unattractive?"_

" _No, you pretty much want to nail them too."_

" _What if they don't want to have sex with you?"_

" _Doesn't matter because the sex thing is already out there so the friendship is ultimately doomed and that is the end of the story."_

" _Well, I guess we're not going to be friends then."_

" _I guess not."_

" _That's too bad. You were the only person I knew in New York."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _September, 1942_

* * *

The first time Harry saw Tom Riddle, well, actually saw him, not seeing the deformed back of Professor Quirrell's head melting as she somehow lit him on fire, she thought he was almost too perfect.

She was twelve at the time, second year, and stumbled across the notebook in the flooding dungeon bathroom and inside of it was none other than this strange, perfect, boy who claimed to be a memory from fifty years ago.

It was easy to understand what had happened to Ginny and why. Hell, in retrospect, Harry couldn't help but shudder and think that it could have so easily been her instead. If Lucius Malfoy had slipped it into her cauldron instead, if Tom had met her with all his pretenses, all his smiles and charm, and who was she but twelve-year-old Harry Potter who still wondered if she really had any friends at all and…

Well, the point was, that Harry got it and if Ginny was still angry and horrified a few years later and practically worshipped the ground that Harry walked on, then Harry got that too (even if it was still a little unnerving and so uncomfortable).

That wasn't the point though, the point was, that even at the time, as Harry had looked up at him through thick coke-bottle glasses, taking in all his tall dark and handsome glory (except with pale blue eyes, the kind that should have almost been an unnerving color but somehow weren't), she'd thought to herself that he was almost too beautiful.

There was a symmetry to him, a highness to his cheekbones, the thickness and length of his dark eyelashes, the bones of his hands at once both strong and frail, that was almost so perfectly human that it ceased to be human at all. Like looking at a sculpture by an art student, where the body and the face were too academically thought out, lacking all the normal imperfections of a human face, and started to look downright wrong. Where you could glance at them and shudder and think that they didn't look human at all, that in fact, that very perfection, that golden ratio, made them look like monsters.

The trouble was, that Tom Riddle was almost that pretty, but not quite.

It was a weird thought, one Ron didn't have the patience for (that and talking about the prettiness of any boy in general sent him running in the opposite direction), and Hermione found unnerving and not quite understandable (Hermione, also, delusionally, believed herself above judging boys by their appearances and would in no way admit that half of the reason she'd been so giggly over Viktor Krum wasn't how sweet he was or his brilliant mind for quidditch but that he was an undeniable man-hunk). Which, Harry supposed, was fair. You kind of had to see it to get it, but even Ginny, bogged down by all her own horrible memories of Tom Riddle screwing with her eleven-year-old brains for shits and giggles and murder, didn't seem to have the same impressions or thoughts that Harry did.

Which was also, given everything, completely understandable.

It just made it… hard, sometimes, to express all of Harry's bumbling, quasi-philosophical, thoughts when it came to Voldemort and the boy he'd once been. Not that this really mattered, everyone listened to the important stuff, and the important stuff was that he was a right monstrous bastard who had destroyed or was set to destroy everything Harry cared about.

Oh, and that he was alive, and a giant snake man.

Except no one really listened to that last one, except the people who really mattered she supposed, the rest though… Well, Harry had thought her fourth year was damned difficult, she hadn't realized the fifth would be that much worse.

She now had the scars to prove it, "I must not tell lies" on the back of her right hand, courtesy of one giant pink toad woman with a bizarre and unnerving love of kittens, Dolores Umbridge. Ron might have run off for the first third of fourth year like a complete ass while Harry had been set up to resurrect the dark lord and then be slaughtered like a pig, but at least no one had made her go carving "Potter Stinks" into her own skin while Voldemort invaded her brain.

However, that was off topic, again, and also somehow not even the worst part. Even worse than terrible, horrible, occlumency lessons with Snape and learning her father was, well, a bully and an asshole and not the perfect dad she'd always pictured and everyone else had always told her about.

The trouble was, that fifth year, somehow, had impossibly gotten worse than all of that combined. Somewhere between Harry, stupid knight in shining armor as always, getting Umbridge kidnapped and… well, Harry didn't really want to know, by centaurs, and then leading all her friends into the dumbest trap that Harry should have seen coming a mile away and everyone had warned her about this whole year what with Voldemort literally chilling in her brain, getting them all maimed or killed and she didn't even know…

Well somewhere, in that giant pile of garbage that Harry had created for herself, Harry's life had gotten ten thousand times worse.

Which brought her, conveniently, back to how alarmingly, almost too, pretty Tom Riddle had once been, before his plastic surgery of the giant snake man variety. Because she was staring at him, right now, in the flesh, across the table from her as he charmingly smiled at Lucretia Black who gave him what she no doubt thought was an amused and seductive smile back while Harry tried and failed to not choke on her sandwich at the sight of this, dare she say, domestic scene.

It was the Potter Effect times a million, Harry Lily Potter, stupid 'damn the torpedoes' Gryffindor that she was, had, by frolicking through the department of mysteries' time room like a complete jackass with spells flying everywhere, managed to send herself over fifty years into the past.

Where, upon crawling her way to Hogwarts after somehow managing to get fake papers about homeschooling and what not and then pleading to the headmaster, she'd been conveniently not sorted into Gryffindor (thank you Sorting Hat) and been put into Slytherin, with Tom Riddle, in the flesh.

Sometimes, when she looked at him, she could swear his skin glowed it was so flawless.

"What is the mudblood staring at now?"

Harry looked over, blinked, tried to adjust her glasses (then remembered, oh right, you don't have glasses anymore because you got magic time dust in your eyes that, miraculously, did not make you blind but at least gave you twenty-twenty vision), and sheepishly grinned at Draco's grandfather, Abraxas who was sitting several feet from her and directly in front of the wall she'd been staring at for the past ten minutes while desperately not staring at Tom Riddle.

The Malfoy sneer appeared to be genetic, not only that, Draco's was watered down. Or ,maybe, she'd just stopped taking Draco seriously enough to really care after he'd made the ultimate threat of "my father will hear about this, Potter" for the fiftieth time in a week. Thus far Abraxas had never once pulled out the atomic bomb of, "my father will hear about this, Potter!" or well, Evans, Potter had seemed a bit presumptuous of a name to claim for herself what with the time travel and all. Either way, she wasn't sure if it was refreshing or downright surreal.

"Evans," Malfoy said to the chuckling of Orion Black sitting next to him (and Merlin did he look horribly like Sirius) as well as the other Slytherin aristocratic fraternity brothers, "Staring won't make your blood any cleaner."

Now, in the old days, Harry might have said something, actually Hermione or Ron would have beaten her to it, but Harry would have at least scowled in disapproval and said something. However…

These weren't the old days anymore.

Harry was sitting by herself at the end of the table, a good three feet from anyone else, ignored by Slytherins for being muggleborn and Gryffindors for being a Slytherin, and more… With everything that had happened, god what about her friends still trapped in the department of mysteries, her own bullheaded stupidity…

She didn't know, she just… She held her tongue, tried not to flush with anger as they laughed at the joke (and Merlin, was Malfoy glancing to Tom Riddle for approval, that was just so sad… yet somehow so like Draco at the same time) and went back to picking at her food and going over the pros, cons, and what the hell was she going to do now list again.

Pros: Harry was alive. She felt this was a very important pro, after all, she had the feeling if she was anyone else in the world and not the girl-who-lived-through-every-certain-death-encounter she'd probably be a gory pancake on the time space continuum.

Or whatever it was that happened to people who went back too far, Hermione had death-lectured her at one point during the end of third year, after the Buckbeak adventure, but the details were honestly kind of vague as Harry hadn't really cared.

(Hermione was great and all, Harry loved her dearly, the best friend she'd ever had, but sometimes Harry wondered if Hermione didn't just love hearing herself talk maybe a little too much.)

Other pros: Harry was in Hogwarts. Sure, it was Hogwarts from fifty years ago, but she was alive and in the best place on the planet Earth. She might not be with all her friends, she might not ever see her friends again, but that was… Not alright, but she could live, she was alive. Plus, she got to redo her fifth year, which probably was a good thing, since DADA had kind of gone down the tubes what with Umbridge.

Actually, all her DADA had gone down the drain except for third year, and, dare she say it, her fourth.

Of course, then there was the strange pro that might not be a pro at all: Nobody hated her, sure, nobody liked her, but nobody hated her either. At least, not on a personal level, they disliked the category she fell into whether that was Slytherin or muggleborn, but Harry Evans personally? Forget it, they probably barely knew her name. More, for the first time since she'd gotten to Hogwarts, people were perfectly indifferent to her. Not even the forced, faked, "Oh, Harry, you think I care about you, girl-who-lived? Please, you are beneath my notice," facades that she ran into now and then.

Tom Marvolo Riddle, the dark lord, who she had encountered every year since the age of eleven (well, except for third year with Sirius and all the dementors), and tried to murder her in increasingly horrifying ways every time, appeared to be entirely indifferent to her presence.

He didn't even bother to charm her, that's how goddamn indifferent he was to Harry Evan's very existence.

It was… surprisingly liberating. Well, Harry had always known that the whole fame thing made her very uncomfortable. After all, she'd just been thin little Harry Potter living under the cupboard before that, going from that to… the equivalent of wizard Jesus was a bit extreme for anyone to really be able to handle. Harry thought she'd done a pretty alright job, considering, but that didn't mean she liked it.

In fact, she'd said several times that she downright hated it.

"Hermione," she'd said one night in the girl's dormitory, staring at the ceiling, her fourth year after Ron had made his rather dramatic exit stage left with his own 'Potter Stinks' badge worn proudly, "Sometimes it scares me how much I'd be willing to sacrifice to just be a normal girl with my parents alive and undo everything."

Her parents might not be alive, her friends might all be trapped in the department of mysteries, she may be a right idiot, and she might be stuck fifty years in the past with baby Voldemort and all his pals, but this was likely the closest to normal Harry was ever going to get.

Was it terrible that, on some level, Harry could appreciate that?

Then there were the cons… There were so very many of them.

Con the first: Harry was an idiot and was singlehandedly responsible for killing all her friends, leaving them behind to their deaths, and now would spend the rest of her life tormented by her imaginings of them screaming.

Good show, Harry.

The slightly less terrible con: Harry had been sorted into Slytherin, if she'd just been sorted into Gryffindor like the first time she wouldn't be having that problem. Sure, Minerva McGonagall was there, and Hagrid, and it'd be weird being friends with them (well not Hagrid as much) but at least she'd be able to make friends.

Being muggleborn Slytherin meant that nobody would want anything to do with her.

Apparently, pointing out this scenario to the hat had been, "A very Slytherin thing to say, Miss Potter."

And then, of course, Tom Riddle was alive, in Hogwarts, was prefect of her house and could flaunt his authority over her as he damn well pleased, and everyone loved him. Well, everyone except Professor Dumbledore, who made it a habit of glaring contemptuously at Tom whenever Tom tried to answer a question in their OWL Transfiguration class.

Still, go Dumbledore, if Harry ever needed a sign that beneath all his eccentricities he really was a brilliant man then that was it.

Still, at least Tom really, didn't seem to care one way or another about her. It actually was almost unnerving, she kept expecting something from him, anything, even when she'd met his younger self in the diary (who hadn't had the joys of experiencing being blown up by the infant Harry) he'd been… Interested, she supposed she'd call it, or maybe assessing.

There was one final worry in her head though, even though it was more of a Hermione type thought than a Harry one. If Harry was here now, in the past, and had met Tom Riddle, then why didn't he seem to recognize her in the future? Sure, she'd been younger, Gryffindor, had the glasses, and had used a different name but…

Maybe there had been moments where he'd looked at her, in the diary, or in the graveyard, and seemed to try to see through her, but he'd never said anything or asked anything that would have made her thought, "Oh my god, I'm going to wind up fifty years in the past with Lord Voldemort for a housemate!"

And if she did change anything… Her eyes drifted over to Hagrid, still in school, if she did change anything then what would happen to her? What would happen to Hogwarts, to everything? If she changed things, any slight number of things, could she still somehow get home?

She sighed, determined that thinking of time travel paradox while at breakfast was not the greatest use of her time.

Ultimately, Harry had to keep her head together and find a way to get back home. Somehow, in some impossible Potter way, she'd have to spring forward fifty years in time and hope to god she didn't change anything. That was the end of it, period, all that could be said and done.

And Harry would not, could not, indulge in her saving people thing and sacrifice her own friends and even Sirius to do it. Because that's what was at stake, ultimately, and no matter what happened to Hagrid (or oh god, to Myrtle) she had to remember that.

Yet, even as she stood and dashed off to class, a class she shared with Tom Riddle and many of her Slytherin peers, she couldn't help but think that this was probably one of those things that was far easier said than done.

* * *

"Actually, you don't even need that heavy of an object to take out a troll," Harry Evans answered, sitting next to him, a peculiarly bright look on her face, "Honestly, a troll's own club will take it out if you lift it even high enough above its head and concuss it. Three, maybe two, first year students could do it, even when only two of them can pronounce _Wingardium_ _Leviosa_ correctly."

Harry Evans, muggleborn transfer student was, in a word, perfectly bizarre. He'd honestly meant to pay her no attention at all when she'd been sorted into Slytherin, nothing more than a distraction, the unfortunate might have been if Tom himself had been less astute and ruthless, but she made it very difficult to pass her over.

It wasn't simply how she dressed or acted, as if she had no thought or care at all for her appearance and femininity, it wasn't simply how she talked (using words Tom had frankly never heard in his life and he was certain she'd made up), it wasn't just the bizarre anecdotes or trivia that would spurt from her mouth in this or that class (as her intimate knowledge of slaying trolls in today's DADA lecture would prove), this whole combination instead produced what had to be the strangest girl he'd ever met.

In her own words, Tom was almost certain she'd accidentally stepped off the mothership and that she was still phoning home, whatever the bloody hell that even meant.

If she'd been a little quieter, a little… more normal, then she might be considered attractive. She was very pretty, when considered objectively, she was thin and lean, lacking the curves of the more traditionally attractive woman, but her dark hair was wild and thick with curls, and her eyes were the brightest green he'd ever seen.

However, there was a world of difference between her and someone like Lucretia Black, and as such whatever base physical appeal Harry Evans might have had going for her was ruined every time she opened her mouth.

Well, that and her blood status also worked quite a bit against her, something she appeared to know intimately and had chosen to quietly tolerate.

Merrythought considered Evans comment with raised eyebrows, pursing her lips and looking as if she wasn't quite sure what to do with that information, finally she said, "Thank you, Miss Evans, for that fascinating fact."

Evans beamed slightly before leaning back, listening as the lecture went on to describe facts about other magical creatures and the dangers of them. Her pale hand accidentally brushed his and immediately, with a look of alarm combined with horror and disgust on her face she snatched it back and surreptitiously scooted her chair further from him.

That was the other thing about Harry Evans, for whatever ineffable reason, she found him both terrifying and morbidly fascinating. It might be flattering, or perhaps even cute, if it wasn't so damn bizarre.

And somehow, in Defense Against the Dark Arts, he'd been stuck sitting next to her.

"Now," the professor said looking at them all with her rather hawkish eyes, "As you all know this is your OWL year, you have elected to continue past your basic requirements in Defense Against the Dark Arts, and because of that, on top of the usual homework and practical demonstrations, there will be a partner project due at the end of each term. And you will not be picking you partners!"

This was accompanied by a glare at the students, partner projects notoriously being a political nightmare filled with complaints that no sane professor wanted to handle. On seeing no one retort, or look too dismayed, Merrythought continued, "Congratulations, your partner is sitting next to you, I want you two to shake hands, and then, this week, brainstorm just what it is your project will be."

Tom slowly, oh so slowly, with a feeling of dread in his stomach turned to look at Harry Evans who, in turn, was mirroring his expression of horror and distaste on her delicate features. Both seemed to realize at the same time that neither had a legitimate excuse to get out of this, not with Merrythought, who prided herself on being disciplinarian and unmoving in the face of student grievances.

Meanwhile, as if nothing at all was wrong, Merrythought continued, "And it will be a practical demonstration, this is a practical class, so I don't want any posters or papers or any of that nonsense. Real spells here children, legal, spells!"

They were dismissed routinely after that, Harry and Tom both lingering, sitting in their chairs in dual states of shock. Finally, Harry succinctly summarized, "Well, shit."

He glanced at her, grimacing slightly, honestly sometimes he didn't wonder if she thought she was a man. Women simply didn't curse like that, Tom wouldn't for that matter, it was classless and vulgar and highlighted exactly the sort of world Harry Evans had come from.

Still, he did agree, "Well, Evans, it seems you and I will simply have to tolerate one another."

Harry's face twisted into some bizarre expression that was half a grimace and half utter despair.

"Yes, I'm just as delighted. You're free tonight?"

For a moment Harry sat there, trying to twist her face back into some semblance of normalcy, and finally she stiffly nodded, and said, "Sure, I mean, the sooner we do it the sooner we're done, right?"

He could say many things to that. He could even show how insulted he was that she seemed to have a problem with him, no one had a problem with Tom, and what had he ever done to her anyways that would warrant such fear, distaste, and even loathing? If anything, he should be openly sneering in distaste of her and all she represented, but no, Tom Riddle was better than that, he'd trained himself to be better than that. Slughorn would approve of him showing kindness, or at least courtesy, even on vulgar and vexing tomboys like Harry Evans.

So, he just smiled down at her, kindly, with all the charm and sincerity in his insincerity that he could muster, and said, "Oh, Harry, surely you don't mean that."

Her face twisted back into horror and… recognition?

Tom decided to give up while he was still ahead, there were better uses of his time, "Just meet me after dinner, would you? Then we'll head over to the library and get this over with."

Time, unfortunately, moved far too swiftly. He and Evans were seated far apart in the rest of their shared classes and he managed to move past her, focused instead on Dumbledore's constant dismissal of him, carefully joking with his classmates and allowing them to pander to him in such away that no, of course they weren't pandering to the mudblood, Tom was an exception, and more, it wouldn't be such a bad thing to loan Tom some of their private books now and then, he was just so useful and sophisticated despite his trash ancestry…

Thus, with a dinner filled with wry humor, subtle witticisms, coy flirtations, and the usual political jockeying done and over with he found himself sighing and staring at the end of the table where there, by herself as always, was Harry Evans reading some theoretical nonsense book on the space time continuum that no one in their right mind would take seriously.

This, he thought to himself as he watched her balance the book in one hand with a determined look on her face and pick at her food with the other, was the partner he'd been slated with for the rest of term.

Sometime in the future, when he enslaved all of wizarding Britain and became a dark emperor over this land, Lord Voldemort, he was going to kill Merrythought for ever enforcing this indignity upon him.

In the meantime though, he simply walked over to Evans, ignoring the somehow smug looks of sympathy thrown to him by his Slytherin peers and then sighed, "Evans, I'm afraid it's time."

Her book snapped shut, as if it had contained some dark secret that should Tom find it out the world would be perfectly and utterly doomed. She looked over her shoulder at him, large green eyes blinking as she edged away, hand darting quickly towards her wand. Then she appeared to remember where she was, who she was looking at, and she flushed, "Oh, right, study thing, project, yes… Right."

Was that even English?

Tom just sighed again, stared at the ceiling (appropriately dark and overcast) in supplication, then said, "Well, we'd best get to the library then."

She dutifully followed, somehow instinctively knowing every passageway of Hogwarts despite being a transfer student, another oddity, a thankful one though, as it meant that Tom hadn't had to direct her to her classes even on the first day, and soon enough they were in the library and Tom was listing out spells.

"Now, unfortunately, as this is demonstrative, I can't do all the work for you," he started out, met with a pair of condescending and dubiously raised eyebrows.

"What?"

"Let's be frank, here, Harry," Tom said, dropping his own charade of pleasantness, "You were fortunate in me as a partner, we both know this, however, this time it won't save you…"

"Excuse you," Harry scoffed, interrupting him with a rather offended flush on her pretty features, "I'll have you know I am bloody great at Defense."

Tom offered her a thin and humoring smile, "I'm sure you are."

Harry seemed to find this amusing, an actual startled laugh coming from her throat, a smile stretching on her lips, "No, Riddle, I'm really bloody good at Defense."

There was something in her eyes then, some hidden knowledge, not only about herself and her own depths but Tom as well, that he couldn't help, even against all his instincts, but take seriously. As if somewhere in the very depths of his soul, that this, above all other things, he could take Harry Evans' word on.

"Alright then, good, because we'll need a spell we both can master before the holidays," Tom said, "Perhaps even a counter if we're practically demonstrating it."

"Or," Evans supplied pragmatically, with a rather amused and ironic twist to her smile, "One we've both mastered already, that way we don't actually have to spend any time together."

Well, didn't she have a high opinion of herself?

Still, it was a… tempting offer, and it did solve both of their problems. Clearly, neither of them wanted to be here. That was one thing for Harry Evans, many girls would have been dying to have Tom in this position and drag it out as long as possible, an insipid attempt to seduce him no doubt. Harry Evans, couldn't wait to get out of his presence.

"It would have to be something not taught in the curriculum," Tom reminded her, "Something impressive, at that."

"I'm sure I can manage," Evans said rubbing the back of her head, "What about _explelliarmus_?"

"Far too simple," Tom said, not necessarily in the curriculum thus far, a bit above and beyond, but far beneath Tom's level, he'd demonstrated as much the year before.

"Damn," Evans said, then she looked at him, really appeared to look at him as if she was seeing him for the first time.

"What?" he asked but she didn't answer, instead he could practically see the wheels in her head spinning away, grinding against one another to form some thought that she couldn't quite believe she was having, didn't want to believe she was having.

"What is it?" he prompted again, watching her lips frown, the minute internal shake of her head, the look in her green eyes that screamed that whatever she was thinking could never work in a million years.

"Evans," he finally prompted, and this seemed to do it, she sighed, cringed visibly for a moment, then said, "I… Don't suppose you can make a corporeal patronus?"

He looked at her, feeling as if something inside of him had just plummeted outside of his body, leaving him hollow as he stared at Harry Evans. Finally, in a voice that was far calmer than he would have thought possible, "You can produce a fully corporeal patronus?"

She nodded before rambling her usual style of explanation, "Yeah, since I was thirteen… There were hordes of dementors involved, it's a complicated story."

He just kept staring, looking at her, and wondering how the hell someone like Harry Evans could produce a corporeal patronus, and by the age of thirteen. She didn't seem to be lying either, in fact, she barely seemed to comprehend the magnitude of this, how rare it was for any wizard to produce a corporeal patronus at any stage in their life.

"So, I'm guessing that's a no?" Harry asked, hesitantly, and he felt himself flush as he remembered that it was a no, and that that meant…

He stood, chair scraping back from the table, Harry leaned backwards at the sight of him, swallowing nervously, hand fingering her wand, "Riddle?"

"Outside," he said quietly, "You are demonstrating, now."

Harry frowned but acquiesced, packed up her supplies, and followed him out to the edge of the lake where all the other students were headed back to the warmth and light of the castle. And there on the edge of the dark water, she held out her wand and cried out into the night, " _Expecto patronum!_ "

A great white stag, made of blinding light, leaped from the tip of her wand to run across the lake and out towards the sea, and watching it Tom felt a pang somewhere inside him, hollow and empty, and entirely certain that he'd never be capable of producing something like it.

And yet he coveted that light, the smile and wonder on her face, more than he'd coveted anything before.

"This," he said with a certainty that was not to be questioned, "Is our project."

She turned, wand still in her grasp, still ready, always ready whenever near him and looked at him, "The patronus?"

She then looked back out towards the lake then at him, a frown on her face as she fully considered the situation, "Oh, look, Riddle, I know I suggested it but…"

"You're capable of it," he snapped back, unsaid was that if Harry Evans could do then Tom Riddle certainly could.

"Well, maybe," she looked very dubious of that maybe, "But maybe you'll have some better idea and…"

"No," he said, short, finally, holding her eyes and seeing how they glowed green and bright even in the dark. Then, turning on his heel, he headed back to the castle, shouting over his shoulder, "This weekend, Saturday afternoon, we'll start."

She stayed behind, looking after him, her face perfectly still and empty of any emotion he could recognize. Once again, somehow, with her fierce eyes on him he felt as if he was some unknowing puzzle she had yet to solve, that she slowly but surely, fit together, piece by crooked piece.

* * *

 **Author's Note: To those of you who will inevitably ask, and I can't believe I have to put this, but this is not a "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" branch off. This is it's own thing, with its own different fem!Harry who is, similarly, if slightly in her own way, utterly ridiculous. So, yes, also, I decided to do the romcom version of the Harry time travels to the Tom Riddle era plotline, because that's what I do. I'm excited, and starting new stories, this is bad, I should not do this, but I will anyway.**

 **Except, know that when I say romcom I mean my version of a romcom, which will end up likely being a hideous mixture of Arrested Development and When Harry Met Sally. So... yes, expect that, but with ten times the Harry Potter.**

 **Thanks to readers, reviews are appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.**


	2. Chapter 2

" _Amanda mentioned you had a dark side."_

" _That's what drew her to me."_

" _Your dark side?"_

" _Sure. Why? Don't you have a dark side? I know, you're probably one of those cheerful people who dot their 'i's' with little hearts."_

" _I have just as much of a dark side as the next person."_

" _Oh, really? When I buy a book, I read the last page first. That way, in case I die before I finish, I know how it ends. That, my friend, is a dark side."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _September, 1942_

* * *

"Harry," it was Hermione, reaching out towards her, bleeding profusely, her arm dangling from her shoulder and only attached by threads of tendons, her eyes glazed over in the spell light of the department of mysteries, "Harry, why?"

And then, like every morning, Harry woke up.

She sat there, gasping for breath, practically panting as she took in the darkness of the room (so similar yet so different to the darkened halls and rooms of the department of mysteries) as well as the sleeping figures of her fellow fifth year Slytherins.

Eventually, with the taste of bile and dread in her mouth, she stumbled over towards the bathroom and into the stalls, leaning against the wall next to the porcelain bowl as she waited to see if she was going to vomit or not this morning.

Mornings… Mornings were the hardest.

They always had been, even when it was just dreams of Voldemort running through her head, or the old recurring nightmares of Quirrell, Sirius dying, Cedric, the chamber, dementors, and any of the old horrors she'd witnessed. Still, after the department, they'd gotten worse.

It'd never been Harry's fault before.

Every time her friends had been pulled into danger, Cedric in the graveyard, it had never truly been her fault at the heart of it. Cedric had haunted her, all that summer the sight of him crumpling like a doll and dying had haunted her, and some part of her had blamed herself for allowing him to touch that cup but this was so much worse.

Ron, Hermione, Neville, Luna… They'd had no reason to come with her, but they'd trusted her, they'd trusted Harry's judgement and her visions to save a man that many of them had only heard of let alone met.

And in return she could very well have killed each and every one of them.

Every morning, after the nightmares, as she sat dead eyed in the bathroom, Harry would once again try and fail to come to terms with the fact that she would be living with this for the rest of her life. Every morning, she would face the fact that she had singlehandedly killed all her friends and then abandoned them, and every morning it would be just as awful as the last.

And no one would ever, could ever, know.

"How long," Harry asked herself, voice hoarse and wry, "Can I really keep this up?"

She didn't know, just that it seemed worse somehow, if she gave up now. Like truly giving up now, giving in, would be to make all their deaths even more in vain than they already were. So, she tried, somehow, to be a normal student and take the gift she'd always wanted and live her normal life to its fullest.

She tried except…

Quidditch tryouts had come and gone. They'd been in that first week, and for a moment she'd loitered there without a broomstick, ready to show these assholes just what she was made of. Except, she'd looked at them, all pureblood men on the Slytherin team, and she'd seen herself on the team, always an outsider. She'd asked herself then who she thought she was kidding. Like she could go back to the old days and pretend it all had never happened, relive her glory days as Gryffindor seeker.

How pathetic would she be, to tryout and play, and try to pretend it had never happened?

It was better anyway, a good chunk of her time in the old days had been spent practicing quidditch, now she could use that time to find a way home and to see just what had happened to everyone at the end of things.

After all, if Harry were to be an optimist, then there was the slim chance she could still somehow fix everything.

From the other room she could hear the other girls' alarms going off, Harry's signal that it was time to stop sitting on the floor feeling sorry for herself and get a move on. With a groan she stood, stretched, stepped out and looked at her reflection in the mirror.

Well, she'd had better days. There were dark rings under her eyes, her hair as usual was a chaotic mess of dark corkscrew curls, her face looked paler than Malfoy's and twice as sickly, but she supposed she was still alive which counted for something.

Though it said a lot that the mirror didn't even comment on Harry's appearance anymore, not after that first horrified remark exclaim of, "Merlin, girl, I don't even know where to start!"

As she pulled her hair back and brushed her teeth she tried to remember exactly what she was doing today, Saturday, which in Harry's case meant a lot of getting nowhere trying to impersonate Hermione and study time travel rather than hanging out with any friends or having a social life. Except, wasn't there something else? Something was nagging at her, some appointment…

"Oh, shit," Harry said, her own green eyes wide in the mirror as it all came rushing back.

She was partners with Tom Riddle for their Defense term project, and, if that wasn't horrifying and horrible enough, Harry Potter, perfect jackass, had decided it'd be a great idea to suggest teaching him the patronus.

"What the hell was I thinking?!" she asked herself, as if her own reflection could tell her why she was so damn stupid sometimes.

"Language!" the mirror chided, but Harry paid it no mind, instead raking a hand through her hair and trying not to panic.

What had she been thinking?

Well, first she'd been thinking that of all the people to get saddled with she'd been stuck with Tom Riddle. Then she'd had the comforting if horrifying and insulting thought that at least he was just as unenthused about it as she was. Which, what the hell? Sure, Harry might not have any friends here and might be posing as muggle born, but at least she wasn't a murderous sociopath conniving for immortality and glory!

Harry had far more of a right to be offended than Tom bloody Riddle.

Then they'd met later in the library and Harry had had the thought that as Defense was her best project and that while Tom Riddle might be an evil genius, Harry had more practical experience than anyone her age had any right to, so chances were they both knew some advanced spell that meant they'd never have to speak to each other again.

Expelliarmus had been her first idea, as it usually was her go-to spell and had served her very well in her career as the girl-who-lived thus far. Of course, he'd gone and shot that one down, like an arrogant asshole, and then she didn't know but the patronus idea had come out.

Maybe, at first, it'd been the thought that people always found that very impressive. The idea that she could produce a fully corporeal patronus at such a young age. True, it'd been hard to learn, it'd taken her a year and desperate situations to get it, but Dumbledore's Army had taught her well enough that virtually anyone could be taught it.

Everyone had that same spark of light, happiness, inside their soul somewhere.

Maybe it'd been that thought, that vague idea and question, if Tom Riddle, Lord Voldemort himself, could ever be capable of casting something like the patronus? If he could, what kind of an animal would his soul take the shape of? Maybe, if he could learn that, then maybe he wouldn't become…

It'd just been a thought, lurking in the back of her head, then a musing possibility as it was something Merrythought probably would find impressive. Then they'd gone outside and suddenly there was no turning back, full steam ahead, she had agreed to teach Tom Marvolo Riddle the patronus.

"Good show, Harry," she muttered to herself with a sigh as she took in her reflection one last time before heading out to get changed, "Good show."

The other girls ignored her as they slipped past her and into the bathroom, preparing to do their hair, a task which took a Lavender-worthy amount of time for them to accomplish. Although Harry did have to say, their hair was always fabulous by the time they walked out, much the same as Lavender's had been. Harry and Hermione had always been tied for the worst hair award in Gryffindor, at least until Hermione's had gone and become somewhat reasonable in their fourth year.

Still, as Harry rolled on her stockings and put on her poor-quality skirt, sweater, and shoes that she'd barely been able to afford after working for pittance pay during the summer, she thought to this afternoon and her appointment with baby Lord Voldemort in all his tall, dark, and handsome glory.

She'd fail, undoubtedly, they'd try a few times and then pick some more reasonable project that they could both complete. Lord Voldemort, she highly doubted, was capable of something like producing a patronus. How could he be? There was barely anything human left in him when he'd resurrected himself in the grave yard.

On the other hand, what was it that she'd been thinking of that morning, when she'd proposed this? Paradoxes and their consequences. What if, beyond all comprehension, they succeeded?

After all, for now, at least, he was human. A right monster, true, a boy who had been capable of draining the life from an eleven-year-old girl, setting a basilisk loose on an unsuspecting school, murdering Myrtle, framing Hagrid, and so much more without a hint of regret. However, he'd been different from that thing attached to Quirrell's head, different even than the resurrected Lord Voldemort.

It wasn't kindness, certainly not compassion, but none the less he'd been far more human than Lord Voldemort could ever hope to be.

So, what if he succeeded?

Did that mean that Lord Voldemort had always been capable of the patronus, but simply found it too embarrassing to show his followers, or else had shrouded that fact in secrecy to maintain his dark image? Or did it mean something else?

Did it mean that, in whatever small manner, Harry Potter was capable of rewriting history?

She paused at the doorway, at once nervous and frightened at her own limitless potential, because yes, that was power a terrible frightening power which she barely dared to even think about. What would Hermione or Ron say to that?

Or even to this?

Was this patronus, she thought as she walked up the stairs towards the great hall and breakfast, was this a sort of test she'd created without thinking about it? If she could do this, if she could teach Tom Riddle the patronus, then did she have a duty to change other things as well? Was even this much dangerous or was it just her toeing the line and seeing exactly what she could get away with?

Hermione would tell her it was beyond stupid, dangerous, to play with things like time, fate, and history. Ron, however, would tell her that Harry above all other people had the responsibility to try.

That's what being a Gryffindor was, she thought as she slid into her seat at the edge of the Slytherin table, a good three feet away from Tom Riddle already seated there and reading through the Prophet with a focus that could be adorable if it wasn't from someone so bloody terrifying. It wasn't about throwing herself into danger, or even rising to the occasion, it was doing what you knew was right even when everything screamed at you about what this could do.

Harry owed it to herself, her parents, the world, to try this much, at the very least.

Still, she thought as she, for a moment, caught the entirely unamused Tom Riddle's eye, this was going to be hard.

* * *

As Saturday afternoon rolled around Harry Evans seemed strangely nervous.

Well, Tom thought to himself as he took her in, no more than usual in his presence, but still, she always seemed so terribly at edge in his presence. She always kept him in her line of sight, not even the corner of her eye, as if he bared watching at all moments.

They were seated outside, by the lake. Harry had insisted, claiming that the scenic Hogwarts landscaping might help Tom get in the right mood. He wondered if she was regretting that, her clothes were in poor repair and hardly stood up to even the early autumn breeze. Whatever else she was, he thought, Harry Evans was as poor a mudblood as he himself was.

She just didn't have the shame and pride to strive and move beyond her circumstances as Tom himself had.

Still, she hadn't said a word about that, had just told him to meet her by the shores of Black Lake after lunch, around one o'clock, and here they now were. Her staring out into the distance and him sitting beside her, both waiting for some sign to start.

At least, he thought, there was no one here to see him and judge him for even associating with her, no matter the fact that he was being forced to by Merrythought. A quidditch game was coming up in an hour or so, as a result most of Tom's peers were pestering the Slytherin team and preparing themselves for the game.

Not that Tom had ever given a damn about quidditch, the whole thing played like an even worse version of rugby, and generally was a waste of any Saturday afternoon. Still, he'd be expected to go and cheer on the home team, even a project with the laughing stock of Slytherin Harry Evans was not an excuse to get out of it.

With that thought he took a moment to regard her again, wondering how this bizarre creature had been capable of the patronus of all things. He'd even wondered for a moment, after he'd gotten back that night, if he had in fact dreamed it. However, he thought not, for all her strangeness some part of him was willing to take her seriously.

Even now, as she stared out at the water, beyond looking on edge she looked pensive, quite serious. As if this moment more than any other might change the course of history. Who knew, he thought to himself with an amused smile, perhaps she was right. After all, today could be the day when Lord Voldemort learned to cast a corporeal patronus.

The lightest magic there was from a man who would one day become the darkest of dark lords… Yes, he liked the sound of that.

Finally, with a sigh, she spoke, "I suppose we should just start with the wand movements and the spell itself."

He felt his eyebrows raise as he took in her rather comically dejected posture, what a strange expressive girl this was, you could almost always read exactly what she was thinking right there on his face, "You think it will be that easy?"

"I think, with you, and with everyone, it's a good place to start," she retorted, then, pausing, that hesitance from a few days ago returning, she noted, "You know, Riddle, we really can do something else."

He frowned, somewhat nonplussed by her lack of faith in his abilities, and drily responded, "Evans, I'm hardly giving up before I try."

"I'm just saying," Evans cut in, holding up a hand to stop his rant, "There's no shame in not being able to do something, you know."

Which was her way of saying that she didn't think he was capable at all. For a moment he was reminded of his own thoughts while she'd cast it, that he himself would never be capable of that, just as he'd never been capable of so many emotions that seemed to plague his peers. Some things, he'd always known, were both beyond and beneath him.

All the same, he felt himself grow affronted, as she had no reason to think anything like that about him. Less reason than even Albus Dumbledore, who had judged him from the very beginning and not once relented in his opinion.

"Please, Evans," Tom said as he stood and readied his wand, "Spare me your attempts to spare me my future heartbreak."

She stood with him, sighing and brushing off her cotton skirt, then with her wand out she slowly went through the motions as she had almost instinctively the night before. There was, he thought to himself, a certain grace in her wand movements that bespoke of experience and dueling. An almost instinctive and unthinking motion that lent itself to spell casting likely even in the most desperate of situations.

What had she said that night? That there had been a horde of dementors surrounding her? Some part of him wanted to scoff outright, actually, most of him wanted to scoff outright, but the other part of him couldn't help but wonder just who this strange Harry Evans girl was and where on earth she had come from.

As she finished she said, "Now, expect failure this first time around, I just want to see the motions and the incantation itself, nothing more than that. And for now, just try to think of the first happy memory that comes to mind, afterwards we'll talk and narrow it down."

"Happy memory?" he asked, eyebrows raising once again, but she looked very serious. Too serious in fact, as if everything hinged upon this moment, on Tom Riddle's own happiness as it were.

"That's what makes the spell hard," she explained, "The wand movements and incantation are easy, but it's the memory that fuels the spell and makes it what it is. If you don't have the happy memory, you don't have the spell."

He'd read as much in books, so he nodded, even as he considered her words.

Happy memory, he thought back, digging through his mind for the nearest happy memory he could think of. Happiness, what was happiness though? Most of the time he was just vaguely content or impatiently waiting for his own future. Days bled together sometimes in Hogwarts, and while he loved Hogwarts, had found his true home here, that didn't mean he often felt happy even here. Happiness tended to elude him on the best of days.

In the end there was only one choice to pick, it'd been somewhat marred by Dumbledore lighting his wardrobe on fire, but those first few moments of receiving his Hogwarts letter. No, he thought to himself, later, seeing the castle itself as he sat in the boat, glowing in the distance across the lake. Yes, that was his moment.

" _Expecto Patronum_!"

From his wand there was the barest hint of an ethereal silver fog, shimmering faintly in the sunlight.

"Holy shit," Harry cried out, looking genuinely amazed as she clapped in delight, green eyes sparkling in the sunlight even while Tom just stared at his own wand as if it had betrayed him, "I can't believe you did it!"

"Did it?" Tom asked, turning towards her fully, any pretense he had at charm or even tolerance of her overwritten by his sudden rage at her pandering delight, "I did nothing!"

Harry, however, didn't seem in the least bit concerned by his baleful anger or the change in his persona (indeed, not even phased, as if she'd subconsciously always known that this angry creature lurked beneath Tom's skin) as her grin widened, "You got some mist, I mean, sure it's not the full spell but holy shit, don't you know what that means?"

What the hell was wrong with this girl? Looking at his mediocre results and surprised at them, as if she truly had expected nothing from him? Him, Tom Riddle, top of their class in every subject by a mile!

Suddenly he wanted nothing more than to kill her one day, no, now, to drain the life from those pretty green eyes and watch her corpse flop down onto the rocks and into the lake itself. Yes, she'd make a very pretty corpse, a far prettier corpse than she ever had a girl.

"No," he sneered, at once feeling dreadfully like Abraxus Malfoy as he looked down at her with cold hard eyes that every orphan knew to fear, "Enlighten me, Evans."

She looked at him as if seeing him for the first time, as if until now he'd been someone entirely different, seeing past his rage and wrath as she noted almost with awe, "It means you're capable of happiness."

Suddenly she was sitting back down on the log, looking quite dazed, "Oh my god, I have to sit down. I was… not expecting that."

There were no words as he stared down at her, sitting there on that log staring out into the distance as if she'd just been stunned, "You weren't expecting me to be capable of happiness?"

Suddenly he was wishing he was at that quidditch game right now, and he couldn't believe he was thinking that. At once he felt somewhat exhausted, as if those words alone had just drained all the energy and anger from him.

What was he doing here? Was this seriously how he was going to be spending an entire term? With this walking mess of a human being? Suddenly, he wanted, no needed, to sit down as well, no matter how out of character it might be for the prefect Tom Riddle.

Well, it wasn't as if he had an image to maintain with Evans, she'd clearly think ill of him regardless of what he did. Whether he smiled or raged, she never even seemed to notice the difference. With that thought he sat down next to her with a sigh, noting, "I hope you know, that I found you both unbelievably aggravating and exhausting."

She furrowed her brow at that, as if those very words confused her, or like they might mean something else entirely. She edged slightly away from him but now that he had her attention continued to stare. Green eyes picked him apart piece by piece. What did she see, when she looked at him?

Clearly, she did not see what Lucretia Black or any of the other girls in Hogwarts saw. Somehow, Harry Evans saw something entirely different, mostly unflattering, yet somehow more fascinating for it. As if Tom Riddle himself was a riddle in his own right, taking years upon years to solve.

What did the midday light cast upon his cheekbones and hair tell her?

Finally, she asked, "What did you think of?"

He scoffed, turned away from her towards the lake and the sea, chastising himself for staring at her for such a long period of time. Not that she appeared to notice or care either way, still, he had some image to maintain if only for himself, "Isn't that private?"

"Not if you want to produce a patronus," she said wryly before continuing with more seriousness, "Happy memories can be harder than you think. If you don't tell me what you picked, I can't help you think of something better."

Well, she had something of a point there, as much as he wished she didn't.

"Will I get to hear yours?" he asked, a somewhat amused smile dancing on his lips at the idea, an idea which he now found himself truly interested in. Just what kind of happiness could fuel the projection of Harry Evans' stag of a soul?

She flushed for a moment, before going pale, eyeing him in suspicion as if even that was far too much information about her to share, but then she shrugged and said, "Oh probably, I suppose it's only fair."

"Embarrassing?" Tom couldn't help but ask but she shook her head vehemently at his prompting.

"No way, you have to go first."

"I thought about the first time I saw Hogwarts," he said before expanding on that thought softly, "On the lake from the boat, you likely missed seeing them from the station, but the first years are rowed across the lake that first night. It was… the happiest I could ever truly remember being in my life."

At once he felt entirely too vulnerable, too exposed beneath those too green eyes of hers, and he directed her focus away as he drily commented, "Clearly, I was not happy enough."

Harry though wasn't to be distracted as she considered him, placing her chin in a hand and tilting her head as she looked at him, "Not receiving your Hogwarts letter?"

He scoffed, "Oh, no, well parts of that were certainly exciting but…" he trailed off, looked at her, and said, "It's no secret that Professor Dumbledore and I don't exactly get on."

She looked, rightfully for once, somewhat confused by that but Tom was hardly going to elaborate on that incident. Oh no, that one would go down in the history books forgotten by everyone except Tom. No, when the day came, Albus Dumbledore would pay for that humiliation and all the ones since then.

Realizing she'd get nothing else she nodded, turned back towards the lake then thought for a moment, then said, "I know that you think that's the happiest moment you've ever had, and it might be, but the patronus requires a certain kind of happiness. That was a moment. For better or worse it was there, then it was gone. When I first tried I thought about… learning I was a witch, then my first real Christmas, my family… Everything I thought should be more than enough wasn't, because they were just single moments in time, brief flashes of light."

She looked at him, her eyes burning as she reached towards her heart with a pale long fingered hand, "It has to come from your very soul, Riddle."

How could she have eyes like that? How could anyone have eyes like that? Eyes that could be soft and filled with light in one moment and hard as steel in the next? It was a pity, he thought, that her eyes couldn't belong to someone else.

"And your happy moment?" he asked.

She hesitated, drew back, then glanced over towards the quidditch stadium with a frown on her face, "The quidditch game will be starting soon, right?"

Damn, he thought, she was right, "Yes, I expect it will."

He found himself unusually disappointed, they were ending later than he'd expected but he'd been looking forward to what she had to say. Wasn't that strange, looking forward to hearing something about and from Harry Evans? It'd probably be as bizarre and vexing as her though, so he doubted it'd meet his own strange expectations. Perhaps it was for the best that they were cutting it off here.

Still, he considered her as he turned towards the quidditch pitch, took in the strange longing in her expression as she gazed at the stadium even as her body turned away from it and back towards the castle.

"Are you coming, Evans?"

She blinked, looked at him, pointed to herself in comical confusion, "Me?"

"Of course, you," he said with a roll of his eyes, honestly, sometimes he thought she'd been dropped on her head as an infant, "Well, don't you want to support the home team?"

"Well, I…" she trailed off, cringed almost instinctively, as if the idea of supporting Slytherin of all things was an anathema to her.

"Come on, Evans," he said with mock impatience, already beginning to walk towards the stadium, "You must suffer as I suffer."

That got her going, marching up right next to him, ignoring his smirk, "Suffer?! Are you saying you don't even like quidditch?"

His smirk grew broader, "Now, Evans, that's a dirty little secret between the two of us. For the rest of the world, I am as much a fan of this inane sport as anyone else."

"Quidditch is not bloody inane!" she shouted, far too loudly considering he was standing right next to her, "And wait a minute, why did you even tell me that?! Won't it ruin your perfect image!"

"The great thing, Evans," he said as he strolled along, suddenly far more at ease with their relationship, the potential of their relationship, than he'd been a few days prior, "About you being such a bizarre wreck of a human being and a muggle born in Slytherin to boot, is that no one gives a damn about anything you say."

For a moment she looked affronted, flushing, but even then they both knew that she could hardly deny it, "Screw you, Riddle!"

"Yes," he mused, "I do believe this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship."

* * *

 **Author's Note: And Tom finds the one person who he can be a complete and utter dick around, and it makes absolutely no difference to anyone. Yes, what a beautiful friendship this is. Also, who knew so many people wanted Tom/Harry and time travelling rom com? Seriously, were we missing that or something?**

 **Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.**


	3. Chapter 3

" _I can say anything to her."_

" _Are you saying you can say things to her you can't say to me?"_

" _No, it's just different. It's a whole different perspective. I get the woman's point of view on things. She tells me about the men she desires and I can talk to her about the women that I see."_

" _You tell her about other women?"_

" _Yeah, like the other night, I made love to this woman. It was so incredible, I took her to a place that wasn't human. She actually meowed."_

" _You made a woman meow?"_

" _Yeah, that's the point. I can say these things to her. And the great thing is, I don't have to lie, because I am not always thinking about how to get her into bed. I can just be myself."_

" _You made a woman meow?"_

-When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _September, 1942_

* * *

"Evans, good lord, don't you sleep?"

Harry looked up, it was well past curfew and she had been glumly staring into the fire place in the Slytherin common room, perhaps waiting for Sirius' head to pop out of the flames like always.

Except he wouldn't, couldn't, not here in the past even if he wanted to. And… And Harry didn't know what had happened to him and the other members of the order. They'd gotten separated at some point, Harry trying to get everyone out towards wherever the exit went, and then she'd gotten into the time room again and… well… the rest was history.

So now instead of Snuffles laughing at her from the inside of the fire place she looked up and found herself staring at Tom Riddle having returned from prefect duty.

Now, there, at least, was a mystery that could almost distract Harry from her troubles. She didn't know what exactly had happened last Saturday, what had changed between them or what new bonds of friendship Tom Riddle had thought he'd forged, but something was different.

Well, not quite, most of the time it wasn't different. Tom Riddle was still perfect, cheerfully smiling, polite, witty, charismatic, charming, Tom Marvolo Riddle at every hour of every day. Harry, personally, thought it probably got exhausting to pretend to be nice all the time, especially when you were secretly Tom Riddle beneath all that fancy pretense. Still, for most of the time, Tom Riddle didn't seem to mind at all.

Except whenever Harry did run into him when no one else was around or no one was paying attention the mask would drop. Sometimes without a word, he'd just look at her, and she could read all the stark disapproval and contempt in his eyes as he made no silent pretense of what he really thought of her. Then when anyone looked back it'd be gone.

It was more than that though, maybe it was just her, or maybe she somehow hadn't noticed before, but she kept seeming to run into him. Or rather, she'd somehow find herself in places he was at the same time, like that quidditch game he'd somehow roped her into watching, or he'd sit just that much closer at lunch and breakfast. Even this very moment was a perfect example!

Harry had spent quite a few nights out on the couch in the common room into the wee hours of the morning, desperately avoiding the latest round of nightmares, but no one had ever so much as looked at her. In fact, in any given moment of any given day if they weren't snickering at her they were trying to pretend she didn't exist and wasn't an extremely visible stain on their noble house. If Tom Riddle had ever passed her when she was sitting here, then he'd never said anything before, and he'd certainly never stopped to chat.

Still, frowning, and turning her body so that she could look at him directly, she flatly said, "No."

However, at this, at her narrowed eyes and clear dislike he smiled. It was… Well, it wasn't anything like the smiles he gave Professor Slughorn or his Slytherin underlings. By all definitions it was a beautiful smile and yet there was nothing beautiful about it, there was this visible edge to it, something that took great glee in Harry's discomfort, that gave it this almost beastial quality.

For that alone Harry couldn't help but think it was genuine.

"You know, that would explain half the reason you're such a mess," Tom mused, surveying her and inch by inch and finding every bloody inch lacking, "Lack of sleep can do terrible things to you."

"Great, thanks, I'll keep that in mind," Harry blithely responded, wondering when Tom would just go away back to his own dormitory already and leave her alone like he always did.

Except he didn't, know, with far too much grace and style he rounded the couch and sat next to her, giving her a somewhat amused smile as she none too subtly edged away from him.

"We haven't had much of a chance to chat since Saturday, have we?" he asked, and by the look in his eyes, Harry suddenly knew that he'd been keeping very close track of when they had and hadn't been chatting.

Not that Harry wasn't paying attention, she was always hyper aware of Tom Riddle, and for extremely good reasons at that. So, she could open her mouth and say with full honesty that, "In Defense on Thursday you asked me if I had any extra quills."

And even that moment, of his fingers brushing against hers as he took the quill from her, had been horrible.

He blinked, a slight, small thing, a look of dumb incredulity passing his features, then, in a tone that clearly questioned her intelligence he said, "Surely, Evans, you don't think that counts."

"Look, it's the middle of the night," Harry said, "A Thursday night, and I don't know about you, but we have Potions tomorrow and while you may be Slughorn's…"

"Professor Slughorn," Tom corrected, not quite in a Hermione-like manner, he was more amused by her informality with professors than Hermione had been, but certainly in her vein of thought.

Harry just spoke over him, "Favorite student ever, I am probably one of his least favorite students."

"I wasn't the one keeping you up," Tom noted, giving her a rather pointed look that reminded Harry that in a bizarre turn of events she had been the one lounging on a couch expecting to be ignored, "And besides Professor Slughorn doesn't have least favorite students, favorites certainly, but least favorites are reserved for Professor Dumbledore."

Harry scoffed, almost feeling the need to sneer, "Of course, you'd say that."

"Say what?"

"About Dumbledore, you're just offended because he sees right through you just like I do," Harry explained with her own self-satisfied smile, because even if Dumbledore hadn't paid her much attention at all and even if she'd had her problems with him in her fifth year, at least he still hated Tom Riddle.

"Is that what you think?" it was a quite question, edged and dangerous, something wild burning in Tom's eyes even as he said, "I rather think it's the opposite, Professor Dumbledore has never seen me for what I am, and even act of God could not convince him otherwise. You know, I think he may hate you only slightly less."

Harry opened her mouth to retort but Tom held up a hand to stop her.

"Think about it, Harry," this was almost patronizing, the syllables of her name causing her to bristle even as she stared at him, "Think about the way he looks at you when you hand in an assignment or answer a question. Think about how unenthused he seems by your very presence. Tell me, what does he see when he looks at you that he can so thoroughly dislike you after only a few weeks? Is it your hair, your uncouth manner, your almost thoughtless vulgar nature that puts you so at odds with any other witch in this school? He may loathe me, Evans, but you're hardly the apple of his eye either."

Harry grit her teeth through it all, seeing red, feeling anger clawing at her stomach not only at Tom in front of her but also Dumbledore as she thought about the Dumbledore of her fifth year. Dumbledore who had never ever taken her seriously, had never told her anything, and had left her alone to the point where she'd stumbled right into Voldemort's trap.

She swallowed, shook her head, and when she opened her eyes they were cold as stone as she said, "Did you really stop by just to ask me that?"

And then he did the oddest thing, he laughed, a horrible joyful almost hysterical noise that had him doubling over like a madman on the couch. Suddenly, Harry wasn't feeling too confident about this whole meeting, or like she had any idea what was even going on anymore.

Finally, he said as he wiped at his eyes, "I really can say anything to you, can't I?"

He'd said something like that last Saturday, Harry thought, something about how confessing his dislike of quidditch wasn't a problem because no one would listen to Harry. Which, she hated to say it, but he'd been right but this was…

Well, this was goddamn weird.

"Can't you say anything to anyone else?" Harry asked, "I mean, clearly, it's not like I can stop you from saying whatever the hell you want."

"Ah, but Evans, it would hardly be the same," he said, his laughter finally dying down completely and leaving that edged smile on his face, "Now, on Saturday, you never did tell me what your happy memory was."

Oh, it was far too late in the day for that sort of thing. Harry wearily looked at the clock behind her then back at Tom, "Can we not do this now?"

"I have the time," he countered before giving her a winning grin, "Besides, wasn't it you who pointed out that the sooner I figure this out the sooner we never have to talk to each other again."

Yes, but the idea behind that was that Tom Riddle wouldn't bloody talk to her in the meantime.

"If you tell me, I promise to leave you alone for the rest of the night," he said, looking truly sincere with his half-assed promise.

"That's not that bloody long, Riddle!" Harry cried, "You've got what, five hours left on that?"

"Well, you can't really expect much better than that, can you?" Tom answered in response, "After all, we do share Potions together and Professor Slughorn may take pity on your untalented soul and damn mine and force us to work together."

"Oh Merlin, do you really think he'd do that?"

Judging by Tom's expression, the answer to that was a certain yes. Which made it very clear, whenever Harry wasn't studying time travel, she would be sitting her ass down to study Potions. Remedial Potions with Tom Riddle was not something she needed in her life.

"Just tell me, Evans, better now than dragging it out."

Harry let out an aggravated sigh, wondering how it had come to this of all things, and regretting every single decision she'd ever made in her life, "Fine, Riddle, fine just… Don't laugh."

"I'll probably laugh," he said, without any shame whatsoever.

"Don't laugh," Harry insisted, tone strained and eyes sharper as she willed Tom Riddle into compliance, and then thought back to her own unlikeliest of memories.

She'd stumbled on it in the worst possible moment, just in the nick of time to save Sirius and herself but not a moment before that, and it hadn't been anything she'd suspected. It hadn't been her Hogwarts letter, not Hagrid barging into that rain soaked cabin and giving Dudley a pig's tail, not Diagon Alley, not seeing Hogwarts for the first time, not her red jumper given to her by the Weasleys or any part of that first Christmas, not the end of her first year and the confirmation that Hermione and Ron were the best friends she could ever have, not her parents in the mirror, and not even Sirius.

Sirius, the man who'd promised her that he'd take her in, let her live with him and love her the way her parents could have…

Sirius, who could now very well be dead at the hand of Harry's callous, obtuse, stubborn, obliviousness.

Her eyes unwillingly moved to the fire once again, watching the flames, still waiting for him or anyone to appear and… And before Tom could prompt her again she started, "My home life isn't exactly… the greatest. I live with my aunt, uncle, and cousin and they've always hated me. Course, I've always hated them, so it's been pretty mutual for years now but all the same it hasn't been great."

His expression was almost blank at that, she really couldn't read him one way or another, so all she could do was keep talking, tell him the bare minimum she needed to in order to get this story across the way it had to.

"When I was eight I decided to run away, I didn't really have much to pack, so just one day after school I just… left," and it had been like that, for once Dudley hadn't been chasing her with Piers, there'd been no Harry hunt, she'd just been standing there one fall day and realized that she didn't want to go home. So, she'd just started walking, started walking and walking as far as her shoes and legs would carry her without the slightest clue where she was going, just that it wasn't Number Four Privet Drive.

"It started raining really hard about halfway through, and then it got dark, but I still just kept walking until I was in this unfamiliar town with the doors all closed and lights all on inside, but not in the welcoming way. They were the kind of lights that say, 'keep out, we don't want your kind here,' even while they taunt you with the idea that someone else is safe and warm and wanted but that someone else could never be you."

The neon signs on the bars and stores she'd passed by had all been lit but Harry had wandered wide-eyed past each one, the sinking feeling in her stomach at the time as she clutched at her backpack that she'd already gone too far, except if she went back now she was sure to face something far worse than even the cupboard.

She'd just kept walking, tired, unable to stop, and crying in the rain as she realized she'd passed the point of no return, but she still hadn't wanted to go back to the Dursleys.

"Anyways, it was about halfway through this little town that I heard it, this song playing on the radio in a nearby store. It sounded like any old song at first, American, old maybe, but nothing special. Either way though, standing there in the rain, cold and shivering and too afraid to go home, I started listening."

She still remembered the words, had made it a point to memorize them after the fact, and hunt down where they'd come from. A strange song sung by a puppet green frog on a television show she'd never seen…

Even those first words, as she'd stood there in the pouring rain, had called to her, _"Why are there so many songs about rainbows and what's on the other side? Rainbows are visions, but only illusions, and rainbows have nothing to hide. So, we've been told, and some choose to believe it. I know they're wrong, wait and see. Someday we'll find it, the rainbow connection, the lovers, the dreamers, and me."_

"And listening to this cheesy, hopeful song about following dreams and rainbows, in the face of everyone who doubted and hated I… Well, for that single moment, I felt hopeful too. Suddenly, it was okay that I was cold, tired, hungry, and so very sad and lonely. It was alright, because I would keep trying, I'd keep looking. Someday, with the lovers and the dreamers, I knew I'd find the rainbow connection."

He didn't laugh, probably because she hadn't told him that it'd been sung on an American television show by Kermit the Frog, but all the same he sort of stared at her with wide eyes for a moment as if he couldn't quite believe what he was seeing.

Finally, he said, "That was the sappiest, most terrible thing, I've ever heard in my life."

Oh, she knew there was a reason she never talked about this, "There's a reason it wasn't exactly my first choice of happy memory. In fact, at the time I was bloody miserable."

Calling home from the inside of the store had been the worst thing in the world, as had her extended stay in the cupboard afterwards, eventually the Dursleys had forgiven her but not before telling her more than once if she was ungrateful enough to run away they might as well put her in the bleeding orphanage.

"The point is that it wasn't just… a moment. It wasn't just happiness it was… It was hope, hope and faith in something I couldn't see then. It was the thought, the belief, that my life could and would get better if only I could persevere," Harry insisted and at this Tom at least stopped sneering and appeared to listen, his pale blue eyes almost glowing in the half light of the fire, "And that's the real trick, because for better or worse, that ridiculous moment defined who I am today. You have to find the moment Riddle, that for better or worse, drives you forward and gives you hope that things can change for the better."

"And if I don't believe things can change?" he asked quietly, as if he was almost afraid of Harry's answer, even though he more than anyone else had the potential to change the world.

How ironic was it, that Lord Voldemort, didn't believe there was hope to change things.

Still, Harry could only give him a rather pitying look as she stood and made her own way upstairs, "Then you'll never be able to produce the patronus."

* * *

Friday came and went and as Harry Evans had predicted he'd paid for their conversation the night before. It had been late by the time she'd stopped talking, later by the time he'd finally made his own way to bed.

An inspirational muggle song on the radio, she was right to be embarrassed by it, Tom was almost embarrassed for her. Yet all the same, something she'd said towards the end had sunk into him, and he'd sat there and for perhaps the first time in his life wondered if he really was capable of that kind of happiness.

Not the superficial happiness that even she had dismissed but that sort of… stubborn hope. A stubborn faith that even now seemed to drive Harry Evans towards some unknown goal, so that even being friendless, even with some invisible unknown weight hanging over her shoulders, couldn't stop or even slow her down for a moment.

Harry Evans, he could now see, would be perfectly fine to remain the mudblood outcast of Slytherin, because in her own strange way she was far beyond such concerns. She had already long since walked past them, chasing visions and rainbows of the future, without any regard for the thoughts of her peers.

A large part of him couldn't help but sneer at that, and a large part of him did as he coldly glared at the back of her head in Potions, watching as she cringed each time she dropped an ingredient into her cauldron as if just waiting for it to explode.

Yet a smaller part of him, a part Tom didn't wish to acknowledge existed, noted that Tom himself had never been strong enough to simply ignore the thoughts of everyone around him. At the orphanage he was a tyrannical king, causing hell for the other orphans and the matron, but he'd made sure each one of them feared his very name. Here he was adored at every turn by professor and student alike, twisted his own personality into unrecognizable shapes to win over even the staunchest of Gryffindors and most stubborn of purebloods couldn't help but love him. Only Dumbledore, that bastard Dumbledore, looked at him with cold contempt and even that was not the contemptuous indifference that every member of the school showed Harry Evans.

No one, he had promised himself from the very beginning, would simply pass Tom Riddle over.

It suddenly struck him though, this dreadful epiphany, that Tom cared what each and every one of his insignificant peers thought of him.

Yet Harry Evans didn't care about any of them, not even Tom, especially not Tom.

At dinner that night he found it harder to put on his show, to the point where even that dullard Goyle noticed, and Lucretia batted her eyelashes at him sweetly to convey her sympathy that Tom was, "Feeling under the weather, love."

And for a moment, the vision of Voldemort dismissed to the future, he wondered why it was that he tried so hard for people who ultimately mattered so little? Was this going to be the rest of his life? Him pandering to these lordlings and ladies in the making?

Was this what Voldemort would be, in his own way? Not them pandering to him but him putting on this show of a tyrannical magical lord for them and still pandering to their expectations even as they licked his boots?

It was late Friday, he was already tired, and still he paced in the common room as he tried to sort out his thoughts.

Why did he care this much? Why should Harry Evans existence mean anything to him, even as a counterpoint to his own? Why did he need her opinion as much as he needed everyone else's? And how could she so easily do what he couldn't, from the patronus to anything else?

Was it simply because she was like everyone else, like what he'd thought of her in those first few weeks before the dreaded Defense assignment, odd yet dull, completely unextraordinary, and resigned to a pitiful existence? Or was it something else, something beyond that? Because even Moaning Myrtle still moaned about the woes of her existence, her own wretched loneliness, every hour of every day in the Dungeon bathroom for the whole school to hear.

What was this boundless determination that burned in her green eyes, that had her in the library every afternoon pouring over the oddest collection of books with a focus that was at odds with her haphazard appearance?

And why did Tom suddenly envy her for it?

He looked down at his wand, gripped it tight, and suddenly knew exactly where he was going to go and what he was going to do. Walking down the hallways, passing by those few late-night stragglers making their way back before curfew, he made his way out towards the lake.

There he raised his wand forward, at the ready, and flashed his mind back through every moment, happy, sad, and bittersweet that had happened to him in his life. His memories were a gray monotony interrupted by flashes of rage and smug triumph and his grip on the wand became that much tighter. The parade of images continued into Hogwarts, that bleak despair interrupted by moments of wonder and magic and a ragged ambition and vengeance that fueled his every moment.

Finally, when it had reached its end, with a desperation to find some sort of meaning in his life he produced the movements and shouted, " _Expecto Patronum_!"

For a moment, there was only the silver mist, stronger this time, as if more desperate, then, slowly but surely, a silver snake blossomed from the tip of his wand.

And he didn't know if he wanted to laugh or cry as he stood there watching it regard him with stars for eyes, because he hadn't thought about his letter, not about his sorting, not about getting his wand, or even seeing Hogwarts for the first time.

No, he'd thought about last Saturday by the lake, as he'd looked at Harry Evans and realized that for the first time in his life, the only time in his life, he could be himself around this strange lunatic girl.

* * *

 **Author's Note: Oh Tom, you're so cute when you're angry and realizing the pointlessness of your ridiculous existence. But hey, you learned how to be happy by being completely miserable! Next up, more ridiculous things happen as Tom embraces denial yet still tries to make his first real friend and Harry, as you can imagine, is very weirded out and has no clue why this is even happening. It'll be fun.**

 **Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	4. Chapter 4

" _Would you like to have dinner?... Just friends."_

" _I thought you didn't believe men and women could be friends."_

" _When did I say that?"_

" _On the ride to New York."_

" _No, no, no, I never said that… Yes, that's right, they can't be friends. Unless both of them are involved with other people, then they can… This is an amendment to the earlier rule. If the two people are in relationships, the pressure of possible involvement is lifted… That doesn't work either, because what happens then is, the person you're involved with can't understand why you need to be friends with the person you're just friends with. Like it means something is missing from the relationship and why do you have to go outside to get it? And when you say, 'No, no, no it's not true, nothing is missing from the relationship,' the person you're involved with then accuses you of being secretly attracted to the person you're just friends with, which you probably are. I mean, come on, who the hell are we kidding, let's face it. Which brings us back to the earlier rule before the amendment, which is men and women can't be friends."_

When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _October, 1942_

* * *

Harry, you could say, was a connoisseur of the odd, the life threatening, and the alluring mysteries filled with danger that always inexplicably seemed to wrap themselves up by May. Sometimes Harry was struck by the bizarre thought that her life played out much like a television show or a series of adventure books, where she'd be drawn into a strange and fantastic new adventure each year with Ron and Hermione by her side.

Except adventure books were never quite so terrifying.

In a book Harry wouldn't linger on the way Quirrell's face had felt melting in her hand, the sight of Ginny dying with the smug specter of Tom Riddle leering over her, Gilderoy Lockhart's blank look as his own spell backfired, and Cedric Diggory's crumpling body in the graveyard.

The point was though, if there was a mystery, any kind of mystery at all, it usually managed to find Harry and in no time at all it usually managed to spiral out of control. That was just the nature of the Potter Effect. The past, it seemed, was no different, except for the fact that neither Ron nor Hermione were there to share the adventure with her.

Although she had to say, compared to Sirius Black the bloodthirsty Azkaban escapee, the heir of Slytherin, the Philosopher's Stone, the Triwizard Tournament, and then the mysterious prophecy of her fifth year, this mysterious case of Tom Riddle maybe stalking her hardly stood out.

It wouldn't, in fact, if it wasn't Tom Marvolo Riddle doing it. After all, Harry was pretty sure she'd been on and off stalked by Colin Creevy and Ginny Weasley for the past four years.

And she still wasn't entirely sure he was stalking her he was just… not ignoring her.

And staring, Merlin's pants, he stared a lot.

Friday morning after Harry's little embarrassing confession about the rainbow connection he'd glared at her the whole day (not helping Harry's sudden fear that Slughorn really would throw her and Tom together in order to improve Harry's rather mediocre potions), but then Saturday, she didn't know what had happened, but it was like a switch had been flipped. He still glared, still was silently accusing her of something, but he also just stared. Like he was trying to figure something about her out, something that Harry couldn't begin to guess at herself.

Harry herself, aside from the whole girl who lived thing, didn't think there was much to her to draw attention. Well, she looked like a hot mess compared to every other girl here, and aside from Defense she was mostly average or slightly above average in her other classes, but none of those were supposed to draw Tom Riddle's attention.

In fact, nothing about her seemed to draw anyone's attention. As much as it pained her to admit it, Riddle was right in that from professors to students Harry was universally dismissed. Normally, Harry didn't mind this, it was actually rather refreshing compared to the usual universal love or hatred depending on the headline of the Daily Prophet, but it did point out that Tom looking at her, even out of the corner of his eyes in whatever classes they shared, was downright weird.

Especially when he had girls like Lucretia Black practically dangling off his arm, panting after him, and batting eyelashes at every opportunity. Harry may have once been something of a celebrity, but her embarrassing and disastrous attempts to get the required date to the Yule Ball had taught her that when girls like Cho Chang or Lucretia Black were around Harry was not going to be first pick.

(Hermione ending up snagging Viktor Krum may have been the most mortifying and terrible moment of Harry's existence. Not because she wasn't happy for Hermione, Merlin knew she was, but because Harry had been suddenly and coldly abandoned in the dateless wilderness.

Plus, ending up going with Ron had been awkward and weird, like trying to date her own brother when he was wearing his great uncle's dress robes. They'd ended up awkwardly drinking punch the whole time and pretending not to look at each other while Ron glared daggers at Krum's head.)

Plus, at moments like this, where Harry was in the library and really trying to get in the zone, it was really blood distracting. It was a Saturday, pretty much the whole school was off to see the quidditch game, which left Harry relatively alone in the library with her giant pile of theoretical books on time.

She said theoretical because there were no practical books on time travel, probably not surprising since the department of mysteries likely kept a tight lid on time turners themselves and how they were made, but even those wouldn't help her now as Hermione had been very clear that one could only go backward in time and not forward.

Plus, all her thick, wordy, and rather dense text books themselves all said very similar things. Backward had been experimentally proven and verified, though with the caveat that more than a few hours backward would turn you into either a pile of dust or a pile of goo (which left a big old mystery of how Harry Potter had managed to survive that one). Forwards though, forget it, there'd been long rambling theories about fate, time lines, and what not that basically said if one could go forward in time it'd prove that there was no such thing as free will or else prevent free will and the universe might explode.

Or something, it'd been unclear.

Also unclear were the consequences of Harry's adventures to the past. Either a) she wouldn't be able to change anything because all the changes she'd made had already happened, b) the timeline would subtly shift itself to line up with whatever small changes she did make, or c) the universe would explode.

Harry, let it be known, was very against the universe exploding.

Still, the point was, that on any other day Harry would be left to her books and head banging against the table wishing she was Hermione in peace. On any other Saturday, especially, she could count on the library being empty except for her and the dour librarian.

Except this wasn't any other Saturday in early October, because there, at her own goddamn table even, with his own small pile of books and his Transfiguration homework out and open, was none other than Tom Marvolo Bloody Riddle looking like he didn't have anywhere else to be in the world.

Glancing over his book and at him again Harry's eyes narrowed, surveying his penmanship, and god it was as perfect as she remembered. That had impressed her, when she was twelve and picking up the diary, just how beautiful he'd made every letter without even trying. And it'd be his writing too, she thought, in a few months it would be the memory of this Tom Riddle…

He looked up, dark eyebrows raised, as if somewhat annoyed that she was staring at him, "Yes?"

Harry couldn't help but flush, like she'd been caught being a voyeur, and then pointed and whispered harshly, "Don't do that!"

"Do what?" the picture of… Not of innocence, a little too sardonic for that, but like he had no idea at all what she was on about.

"This!" Harry said, motioning to their table, "You, here, and not at quidditch game!"

"English, Evans," Tom said, his lips quirking upward ever so slightly, "Try to learn how to speak it properly."

Harry, more than done, slammed her book shut and hissed out at him, "Don't play dumb with me, Riddle. You know you're supposed to be at the quidditch game with all your pureblood friends and even then, you're not supposed to be hanging out with me in the library!"

He looked entirely unmoved by Harry's very good point, instead setting his own work aside, eyebrow still raised judgmentally, and stating, "I hardly see how I'm supposed to be doing anything, after all, it's my life. And if I don't want to watch fourteen schoolboys on broomsticks beat each other to death in midair with oversized rugby balls while we wait for one of them to finally catch the snitch, then that's my business."

"That is not what quidditch is about!" Harry cried out almost on instinct, and far too loud for the library earning her a glare from the librarian, but then, remembering herself she whisper-shouted, "And that's also not the point, the point is that you have a reputation and you are ruining it!"

"I'm ruining my own reputation?" he asked, again, like he had no idea what Harry could possibly be on about and she was acting like a crazy person.

"Yes, yes, you are ruining it!" Harry said, "Even though it's a Gryffindor-Hufflepuff game I'm sure all your buddies are there and I'm sure you haven't missed a game yet! If they find out you bailed just so that you could steal my table in the library like a creep then…"

Tom held up a pale, beautiful, hand to stop her rant, "First, I have a perfectly legitimate reason to be here, I have homework."

"Homework?!" Harry scoffed, liking how Riddle wasn't even bothering to come up with an excuse of why homework that wasn't due for three more days was being done specifically at Harry's table in the library.

"Second, why the hell should I care what any of them think?"

Harry stopped short, just sort of blinked at him, taking in his sardonic almost challenging look at her while all she could do was stare and try to think of what to say. Finally, pointing at him, she said, "But that's what you do, Riddle, you always care what they think."

It was practically his defining feature, if you thought about it. Well, aside from megalomania and insanity, he was… This empty shell of a human being, a façade, this perfect prefect that could charm professors, purebloods, and just about everyone in the school. Now that she thought about it, she wasn't sure she'd ever seen him do anything that wasn't to twist someone's view of him into what he wanted.

Well, except for this, because if any of them caught him at this then Riddle's reputation would be right down the drain with hers.

He seemed annoyed, perhaps even angry, at Harry's answer but his tone attempted to be light as he responded, "Well, frankly, I don't. One can't pander to the masses all the time and expect to maintain one's sanity. You, of all people I believe, would know about that."

Harry wasn't sure if that was supposed to be an insult or a compliment.

Either way she was more than done with this bullshit. With that, she began to pack the books up in her bag, toting them over to the librarian, and trying to think of some new studying location that Riddle wouldn't be able to easily find. And god, that was sad, that she now had to actively look for a place where Riddle couldn't actively look for her.

What was the world coming to?

Except, to her surprise and horror, Tom Riddle was packing up his things with her, joining her as she walked out of the library.

"No," Harry said, finally in a loud normal voice as they entered the hallway.

"No?" Tom Riddle asked, dusting off his robes and glinting prefect's badge and looking like twelve-year-old Hermione's vision of a perfect student. Hermione would have loved him, Harry herself might have loved him, until he'd revealed himself for the monster he was in the chamber.

"No, no, you are staying in the library," Harry commanded, then, glaring at him added, "You have homework!"

"The homework can wait," and his smile was so sickeningly charming, god she wanted to punch him in his perfect teeth. Well, that or run away in terror, as she had seen that smile before, years before…

He'd worn that smile, that same smile, in the chamber of secrets.

"The homework can't wait," Harry responded instead, suppressing her shudder and walking faster, cursing Tom Riddle and his long legs that could easily keep pace with her own, "That or your minions can't wait or something can't wait and… And come on, Riddle, you must have better things to do than this!"

She rounded on him finally, in the middle of the hallway, looking him dead in the eye and waiting for some answer. At least he had the decency to look upset, as if he realized just how ridiculous and frankly kind of pathetic he was looking, still he didn't turn on his own heel, curse her, or even tell her to get bent. Instead he asked, oh so politely, "Why do you think that I care what they think?"

"What?" Harry asked.

However, he seemed to be on a roll, stepping forward and glaring down at her with those rather intense eyes of his, "Why do you think that I give a damn what a dullard like Goyle, a pretentious spoon fed unambitious and privileged sot like Abraxas Malfoy, or even what flirtatious and naughty Lucretia Black who daydreams about rumpling sheets with mudblood Riddle thinks?"

Harry felt like the were having two entirely different conversations somehow and had no idea what exactly it was that he wanted from her, "I, um…"

He was shouting now, an accusing finger pointed to Harry's collarbone and digging into the fabric of her ragged non-uniform clothing, "Why do you assume that I enjoy spending my time bending and twisting myself into something they can remotely tolerate, just to get a hint of access to their books and old magic, or perhaps just to have some delusion of grandeur that I can hold onto?!"

"Well," Harry said, now with the distinct image of Tom Riddle, baby Voldemort, bending over as his Slytherin fraternity brothers punched him in the stomach, saying 'Thank you, sir, may I have another', "I never said…"

"Do you really think that I have no mind, no ambitions, no shame, no will of my own?! That at the slightest hint of dislike or displeasure I… I remake myself into something more tolerable? What is it you see, Evans, when you look at me?!" his hands fell on her shoulders, hard and heavy, his eyes burning as he looked down at her and forced her to make eye contact. Merlin, his eyes, she'd never realized how blue they were…

Carefully, swallowing, she pried his hands off her shoulders, "Look, Riddle, I… It's not really important what I think. I mean, we both know that, so I think you should go your way and I should go mine and we'll just pretend this whole weird episode never happened."

He looked like he was about to cry, Harry blinked, but no the image stayed. Standing there, hands swinging listlessly by his hips, a blank look of loss on his face, he looked like he was on the verge of breaking down right then and there.

Baby Voldemort, Harry's nemesis, murderer of her parents, murderer of Cedric, the single source of evil in her life, was about to break down and cry in front of her.

"Oh, oh Jesus," Harry said, panicking now, patting him on his arm like they were friends or at least somewhat friendly acquaintances, "Look, whatever I said, I didn't mean it. You can do or be whatever you want to, Tom, and I… Well, I will just be this thing in the periphery of your life that you can ignore completely while you plot world conquest. Alright? Just, please, Merlin, please don't cry."

He didn't, he just sort of nodded, rubbed at his eyes and let out a shuddering sigh even as he whispered, "I'm sorry, I just… I don't know what's come over me."

Every word sounded like he was pulling teeth, which, Harry was pretty sure it was because the idea of Voldemort showing any kind of human weakness like this to anyone… Well, if Voldemort didn't already try to kill her on a yearly basis she was pretty sure she'd be on the top of his murder list now.

"Right, well, we all have bad weeks," Harry said lamely, patting him on the shoulder awkwardly, trying not to shudder at the contact or increase the already large distance between the two of them.

He gave a bitter, wretched, laugh at that as if to say it hadn't been a bad week so much as a bad year. Which, well, if anyone could get that it was Harry. She'd had plenty of bad years, in fact, she'd just come tumbling out of one and into 1942.

Now, standing here in the hallway, awkwardly comforting Tom Riddle in the middle of his nervous breakdown, she was trying to think of how to make her escape. Or, rather, she was trying to ignore her vibrating heartstrings which were telling her that maybe now wasn't the best time to leave Tom Riddle alone.

Granted, if anyone deserved to be completely and utterly miserable it was him but… Well, maybe the idea of leaving him miserable and to his own devices was a rather terrifying one.

He seemed to have made some decision for her though as he finally got a hold of himself, held out an arm as if to have her wrap hers through his, "Sorry, I… Do you want to join me for lunch?"

"No," Harry said, eyes wide, taking three steps backwards until she was flat against the wall with nowhere left to run, "Merlin, no."

He smiled, a strangely soft and bitter thing, and asked, "Am I really so terrible, Harry?"

"Yes," Harry said flatly, deciding not to expand upon that and state that she was pretty sure he might be the devil incarnate. Her answer seemed to amuse him at the very least, rather than insult him, because his smile turned more wry than bitter.

"Well then, I suppose some other time," he said, and with a nod, he walked past her, leaving her pressed against the wall with her heart hammering in her throat trying to figure out what the hell had even just happened.

Then, staring at his back, realizing they still had that bloody defense project and thus a legitimate reason to be forced to talk to one another, she blurted, "Hey Riddle, have you figured out that patronus thing yet? You know, so we don't have to see each other all the time?"

He stopped but didn't turn around, just stared ahead for a moment, and then calm as ever kept walking, "No, we'll meet tomorrow."

Harry stared open mouthed, gawking, and couldn't help but curse when he was out of sight and earshot, "Goddammit!"

* * *

The first Monday of the month was usually the day that Tom and his fellow Slytherin prefect would meet with Slughorn to fill him in on their thoughts, perhaps who to keep an eye on as a troublemaker or rising star, and more besides.

As such, sitting next to his female counterpart, Tom's polite and attentive mask was firmly in place even as his mind wandered. A small part of him lingered on Slughorn, enough to answer questions and talk about this and that, laugh at his jokes in a way that amused his fellow prefect and also amused Slughorn himself. Subtle shifts of character, of relative observation, so that both could see whatever it was they needed to.

His mind though, as always recently, kept lingering on Harry Evans.

God, that girl… If he had any self-respect at all he'd have obliviated her and ignored her completely, as she herself seemed to want. She cringed every time he spoke to her, genuine fear lingering in her eyes, and yet…

And yet it was like a disease, he just couldn't stop. The very idea of stopping, of not having an excuse to be around her, that damned Defense project, had been horrifying. He'd lied to her, made himself look incompetent in her eyes, just so that she couldn't run away from him the next morning.

Then he'd sat there like a perfect idiot, trying and pretending to fail at casting the charm, and forcing her to talk about herself instead and her own happy memories despite the fact that it caused her clear discomfort to do so. There were no names, no hint of her background, just vague ideas of two best friends, a family that hated her, a mischievous and beloved godfather, and the dim memory of parents who perhaps could have loved her if not for their deaths.

Every word she looked as if she knew couldn't possibly hold his interest, was far beneath him, and it was yet he kept listening. More, even when she wasn't talking he stayed, hating himself yet breathing out a sigh of relief that here there wasn't and would never be a show. This show that became more painful by the second so that the idea of going to a quidditch game, smirking to his peers, flirting with his female classmates politely left him itching and restless and wishing…

Well, wishing he was sitting across from a confused and glaring Harry Evans in the library, or out on the banks of the lake staring at the water while Tom tried and failed to produce a Patronus.

Even while he now knew that he could but pretended not to because…

Because he didn't want her running away from him, and he knew that if he had no real reason to be around, if she didn't have a reason to be around… So easily, they could have been ships passing in the night, if she hadn't been sitting next to him in Defense.

That thought, somehow, terrified him.

And all of this, of course, felt him feeling more pathetic and mortified than he'd ever felt in his life. Thank god at least, no one seemed to really notice, even Evans had looked more at a loss than anything else.

The meeting then appeared to be over, Slughorn jovially smiling at them both and saying, "Well done, both of you, and I hope you're looking forward to the next Slug Club. Aside from the Christmas party I do think the Halloween version is the best one I throw all year."

"Of course, sir," Tom said with a grin, his counterpart already slyly smirking and making her escape. Tom normally would do the same, but he lingered.

"Something on your mind, dear boy?" Slughorn asked busy eyebrows raised, and god how Tom hated that belittling term of address, always had and always would. However he had tolerated it for years from Slughorn, and that alone was the reminder he needed to damn his own pride if only so that Harry Evans would suffer with him.

He couldn't and wouldn't hold this scheme of failing to cast the patronus forever. The idea of her thinking he was incapable of it already grated at him. However, there was another way to force her to tolerate his presence, one that gave him a position of authority both academically and otherwise.

And besides, hadn't he warned her already?

"It's Harry Evans, sir," Tom said with a truly heartfelt sigh, as if the overflowing kindness and generosity of his own spirit forced him to lament for the poor girl.

"Ah, Miss Evans," Slughorn said in perfect understanding, his face sympathetic and grave all at once, "I confess that I don't know what we're going to do about that girl. She's just so…"

Slughorn didn't finish, apparently failing to find a word that fit Harry Evans, which Tom had to say was rather accurate of him. Thus far, Tom had yet to find a precise word either.

Tom smiled, a heartfelt sympathetic thing that was in pain for poor, friendless, Harry Evans who had come to Hogwarts without a sickle to her name, "Yes, but I've noticed that particularly she's been struggling in Potions as well as History of Magic. It's been a month now and given her… eccentricities I doubt she'll make friends in our house or any others. I just thought, that perhaps, a good way to acclimatize her to her new school and to improve her grades would be to assign her tutors for both subjects."

Slughorn clapped his hands together, truly delighted at Tom's brilliant thought that any half-wit could and should have come up with months ago if they didn't find Evans so distasteful and dirty, "What a splendid idea, my boy!"

Tom's smile grew charming and bashful, humble where it needed to be but not humble enough to suggest that he disagreed with Slughorn's assessment, "If you say so, sir, I just try to do my part."

"Oh, but who do you think should do it?"

Careful now, Tom thought to himself, he couldn't suggest himself right away lest he seem to eager. So, mulling it over, he noted, "Well, I'm not entirely sure, sir. Abraxas has always been talented in Potions but he's…"

Tom trailed off, leaving the implication that Abraxas Malfoy was a racist prat who would sooner spit in Evan's lunch unspoken. Slughorn nodded though, certainly not needing to be told, "Yes, quite, and Orion while excellent in History of Magic would be no less welcoming…"

He then fixed his dark and beady eyes on Tom, the obvious and only solution available, "Oh, I know you are so busy already, Tom, but do you think perhaps you could spare time for the poor girl?"

"Me, sir?" Tom said, motioning towards himself, as if the very idea had not crossed his mind and more was certainly not what he'd been thinking when he presented the Harry Evans problem to Slughorn, "Oh, but I don't know when I'd find time with prefect duties and my own OWL courses…"

He then, closed his eyes, as if duly debating the decision, his own bleeding heart preventing him from truly leaving poor friendless Harry Evans to the wolves and her pitiful grades in History of Magic and Potions. Finally, he opened his eyes and nodded with determination, vigor, and a charming smile as he sacrificed himself for the greater good, "Well, I suppose it is something I will simply have to make time for."

And to his pureblood peers he would simply grouse that Slughorn had insisted and Tom Riddle, being the favorite, of course had been selected to turn Harry Evans from gutter trash into a palatable woman and someone who could pass History of Magic as well as Potions.

"Excellent, Tom," Slughorn said, clapping him on the shoulder, "Oh, you may not see it the way I do, but with a heart and head like yours I do think you could do wonderful things for our country."

"Well, I should certainly hope so sir," Tom said as he stepped back ever so slightly, still smiling (he was always smiling to these goddamn people), "Still, I should think passing my OWLs and NEWTs is the first step on that particular path."

Slughorn laughed, as he always laughed at Tom's stale and overly charming wit, and it was relieving and aggravating to know that Harry Evans would not have laughed. She would have just stared, mouth open in horror, until Tom broke the mood with whatever dry and caustic thought was coursing beneath the illusion.

Wonderful things for this country, if only Slughorn knew that Tom planned to take this country and reshape it in his own image. His true image, that he would finally drop all these goddamn bloody pretenses and…

Tom let out the slightest of breaths, waved, and turned as he said, "Looking forward to the Slug Club meeting, professor."

Too far ahead, Harry Evans had him thinking much too far ahead, he had to be patient yet. The masks had to hold yet, but when Hogwarts was done, when the heirs of all the great houses had been secured then…

Until then, he had his masks and his costumes, and for breathing space he had Harry Evans the poor Potions and History of Magic student who could hardly say no to some much-needed help.

* * *

 **Author's Note: Tom is emotional and needlessly vindictive, a great combination in your romantic lead! Also, clearly, I just enjoy destroying him inch by inch. Next chapter, expect revelations and Harry Potter to do what she does best, take action and damn all the torpedoes with potentially catastrophic results. Also new in the world of "When Harry Met Tom", "The Rainbow Connection" a non-canon look into the future where Harry explains the lyrics of her favorite patronus inducing song while Tom is... Tom.**

 **Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	5. Chapter 5

" _There are two kinds of women: high maintenance and low maintenance."_

" _Which one am I?"_

" _You're the worst kind; you're high maintenance but you think you're low maintenance."_

" _I don't see that."_

" _You don't see that? Waiter, I'll begin with a house salad, but I don't want the regular dressing. I'll have the balsamic vinegar and oil, but on the side. And then the salmon with the mustard sauce, but I want the sauce on the side. 'On the side' is a very big thing for you."_

" _Well, I just want it the way I want it."_

" _I know; high maintenance."_

When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _October, 1942_

* * *

"Look at him," Harry said, sneering towards the front of Transfiguration where Tom Riddle was sitting next to Abraxas Malfoy, both of them now lounging and exchanging witty, aristocratic, banter with one another now that the practical work was done and the class itself was drawing to a close.

Both apparently oblivious or else indifferent to Harry Potter sitting behind them in her own seat next to one Alphard Black and looking down on them in judgement.

"Look at him chatting, acting like he's so intelligent and sophisticated, which I guess he is, but he's trying so hard," and he really was, you could practically see him sparkle for all the effort he was putting into being devilishly charming, "It's almost sad."

Now, Harry normally wouldn't comment on this, especially not to a conversation partner as unreceptive as Alphard, but she'd seemed to have hit some kind of an internal limit this week. Maybe it'd been Transfiguration, the first Transfiguration since Tom Riddle had point blank told her that Dumbledore despised her.

And to be fair, it was Tom who had said it, so it could be a lie, an exaggeration, or who knows what except she'd walked in and taken her seat and… And as the lecture had gone on she'd realized that Tom Riddle hadn't been lying after all.

Dumbledore wouldn't even look at her, and when he did, it was with that same coldness and distaste that he looked at Tom Riddle. No, worse, an exasperation as if he just knew that looking at her would make him regret the sight. Like he could only barely tolerate the sight of her, couldn't tolerate the sound of her voice at all as he never called on her once in over a month's worth of classes.

And maybe this didn't really matter, after all Dumbledore here hardly knew her at all, and he wasn't treating her any worse than the rest of the school did except…

Except she couldn't help but wonder about paradoxes again, because if Dumbledore remembered Tom Riddle as a student, then surely, he must remember Harry Evans. But if he'd known about this then he'd never said anything, never hinted at it… Unless, unless she was somehow so distasteful and forgettable that he'd completely forgotten her.

Sitting there though, thinking that over in the middle of trying to turn a cup into a canary, she realized that meant he'd never really liked her at all, had never even wanted to tolerate her, and whatever bond she and Headmaster Dumbledore had ever shared was only really because she was the girl-who-lived.

Here, she realized, was the horrible look at a world where Harry was finally judged by her own merits versus her celebrity status. What had once been refreshing and perhaps even a bit invigorating was now horrifying, as she realized that in a world without the girl who lived, nobody liked her at all.

How many people in Harry's life, even among her greatest friends like Ron or Hermione, would like her at all without that scar on her forehead? Hadn't that been the first thing Ron had asked on the train, can I see the scar, Harry? Hadn't that been the first thing Hermione had delightedly rambled about, oh, Harry Potter, I read about you in some book?

Judging by her trip to the past, maybe even her life in the future, the number of people who could ever really like Harry was hopelessly small, perhaps even nonexistent.

She'd felt suddenly so small at that, not just guilty and clumsy and out of place, but hideously small in a way that reminded her of the cupboard beneath the stairs. Hogwarts had been so large and grand, so filled with warmth and friendship and love long denied her…

Except she felt like Cinderella at the ball, whisked away for seven years of enchantment, only to flee home at midnight and discover that her carriage really was only a pumpkin after all.

And were they really wrong, she wondered. Wasn't it Harry the idiot who had gotten every one of them killed or injured time and again? Wasn't it always, every single time, Harry's stupid idea?

So, Harry, in her infinite wisdom and forced optimism, decided to instead think of something far less depressing, namely the root of that horrible epiphany and everything that had ever gone wrong in her life. Tom Bloody Riddle.

"And you know what's sadder?" Harry added, to silent Alphard Black who raised a dark and inquisitive eyebrow at her like he still couldn't believe she was talking to him, "I think Malfoy doesn't even notice. Riddle's so good, so smooth, that he can get away with… Whatever the hell this is, and they all buy it. Every last one of them."

She then paused and acknowledged, "Well, except for me and Dumbledore, but I suppose even Tom Riddle can't be perfect."

She then turned to look at Alphard directly, which somehow didn't hurt as much as she thought it would. He didn't really look like Sirius, well, they looked related, but Sirius looked so much more like Orion Black than he did his Uncle Alphard. More, looking at him Harry remembered what Sirius had told her, that Alphard had given him money and been disowned from the family for it.

And Harry just thought that…

Well, if there was anyone Harry would have wanted to know in the past, someone she wouldn't have a chance to meet in the future, then maybe it was Alphard Black.

"What about you? What are your thoughts on Riddle?"

"My thoughts on Riddle?" Alphard parroted, looking at her somewhat dumbly, cringing as he looked back at Tom, "I can't say I have any thoughts on him."

Alphard was the odd case of a Black family member who was not in Slytherin, was instead in Ravenclaw and even their prefect, which was probably why he hadn't been sucked into being Tom Riddle's lacky with the rest of his family.

"He's always very polite at the prefect meetings or Professor Slughorn's parties, always nice, very witty, very intelligent and top of our class for ages without any competition… I really don't see why you'd have any sort of problem with him."

Harry could almost gape, she felt like that was the most anyone had ever spoken to her without being truly forced to since she had arrived. This whole time she and Alphard had sat together in awkward silence but here he was talking to her, associating himself with her, in broad daylight in front of the whole mixed Slytherin and Ravenclaw class.

More, that he hadn't sneered and other than looking slightly confused about Harry's irrational hatred of Riddle actually seemed to expect an answer. Which… Suddenly, Harry felt very on the spot.

"Oh, well," Harry flushed, paused, then asked, "Would you believe me if I told you he was secretly evil?"

Alphard just gave her a look and as class officially ended, began to pack his things without a word, apparently not believing Harry's claim that Tom Riddle really was secretly evil. Still, Harry felt oddly light headed, like she was in a dream somehow, that someone other than Tom Riddle had spoken more than a sentence to her without clearly visible contempt or strained politeness in every word.

Maybe, just maybe, Harry wasn't Cinderella after the ball after all.

Harry too got up, packing her things, shaking her head and thinking of what was next on the schedule. Today that'd be Divination, her favorite useless elective. Which, even fifty years in the past, would have driven Hermione up the wall. Somehow, without Trelawney, it was still as ridiculous as ever, and round two of interpreting Harry Potter's dreams was about as much fun as round one had been (though, to be fair, at least they didn't all feature Voldemort this time around.)

Harry also had the extremely ironic advantage of being from the future, and if that helped her get a decent grade, well then, she'd hardly be upset about that.

"Evans," Harry, just on the outside of the classroom's doorway, halted in her tracks. There, standing behind her, surrounded on all sides by sneering Slytherin goons (as well as a curious Alphard Black who had stopped and turned to see what all the fuss was about), was none other than Tom Riddle.

Tom Riddle, talking to her, with a live studio audience.

This, Harry thought to herself in some alarm, was new.

After Tom Riddle had abruptly and terrifyingly changed behavior patterns around her, namely, seeking her out in places like the library or the common room or beside the lake, Harry had realized that she was still relatively in the clear. Sure, if Harry was by herself in some corner of the castle away from prying eyes, Tom Riddle somehow always managed to make an appearance.

However, if there were hordes of people around, especially rich wealthy people from Slytherin, then Harry was very much in the clear. People, with Tom Riddle, equaled safety and a lack of awkward and creepy conversations. He'd never actually talk to her with people around, Merlin it'd completely ruin his carefully cultivated reputation. At best he'd just kind of sneer at her or maybe make some terrible joke at her poor mudblood ass's expense while his friends all laughed. The best place to hide, with Tom Riddle, was in plain sight.

Except here he was, friends hanging directly over his shoulder and all sneering down at her in distaste, talking to her in public for everyone and their brother to see.

Harry peered at him closer, head instinctively tilting to the side as her poor brain tried to parse why this was happening, except, looking at him, she didn't think it was really happening. He was looking at her as if it was painful to be standing within ten feet of her, cringing at her mere presence, and yet with a put-upon determination as if there was simply nothing to be done about it and his hand was forced. Like he was just tearing off the band aid now and getting it over with because it'd still hurt like a bitch if he did it later.

It was very convincing, he really could have had a great career as an actor on the West End, but given that it was Tom Riddle whose only real expressions were mildly terrifying, it just looked very reminiscent of a Stepford Wife.

You know, if they cringed instead of smiled.

"Well, Riddle, you going to stand here all day?" Malfoy asked, oddly anticipatory, as if he was goading a friend into something they all clearly knew he hated to do.

Harry couldn't help her rising eyebrows as Tom gave Malfoy a wordless and withering look, as if to remind him of his place and that there were some things even Tom Riddle could not control.

"Evans, it is with extreme displeasure," Tom started, giving a very dramatic sigh along with his polite words spoken in aristocratic distaste, "That I regret to inform you that Professor Slughorn has decided that you need… help."

Harry's brow furrowed, she took a step closer, and asked, "What?"

Riddle just gave her a rather patronizing almost pitying look, "Oh, come now, Evans, we all know you're practically failing History of Magic and barely scraping by in Potions."

"What?" Harry repeated, harsher this time, as the pieces unwillingly began to fall together in her head. Out of the corner of her eye she could see that most of their class had already disappeared, not wanting to be late to the next class, leaving only eager Slytherins, loitering Alphard, and poor Harry Evans behind.

Riddle continued onward, as if willfully oblivious to the snickering of his peers behind him, like Harry was some sort of delightful punishment that had been thrusted upon him, "Fine, then, it appears I'll have to be blunt. It's been a month, Evans, and you have no friends, not even a casual acquaintance to your name, not to mention…"

He trailed off, motioned to all of her with a waving hand, as if Harry Evans herself was some sort of walking fashion disaster. Which, well, was probably true but at this point Harry was not in the sort of mood for that kind of introspection.

Malfoy joined in, interjecting and talking over Tom with a sneer, "You are, in other words, so pitiable and pathetic that you are spoiling the reputation of Slytherin."

"I'm a what?" Harry asked, a real edge to her voice, and she barely noticed as Alphard stepped closer behind her so that he was almost standing next to her shoulder.

Tom spared Malfoy a rather annoyed look, one that perhaps was genuine, "Well, Abraxas, I wouldn't have put it quite so tactlessly, but the point is that our head of house is concerned about how you're acclimatizing to your new school. As such, he's assigned me to tutor you in Potions as well as History of Magic as everyone else would…"

"Rightfully spit in your gutter trash mudblood face!" Goyle, huge and bulky as the future Goyle, said with glee.

"Yes, well, I wasn't going to say that either," Riddle muttered, having the decency or the shame to look slightly chagrinned by his companions' behavior but not taking it back either, "Now, I have a very busy schedule, but I am free Tuesday and Thursday evenings, which we can pray is enough to raise your grades and turn you from this into…. Something more palatable."

Harry looked down at herself, at whatever it was they were seeing then back up at her audience. What… What the hell was this? What was he…

Oh, oh, Harry knew what he was trying to do. This was just another one of his shows, a sneering ridiculous one-eighty from him hunting her down in libraries or common rooms in the middle of the night. Somehow, in some impossible way, Tom himself was behind all this no matter what Slughorn said.

She laughed, a harsh short laugh, and wondered for a moment what they'd do if she told them all here and now. That no, Slughorn probably had nothing to do with this at all, this is all just Tom Riddle, Tom Riddle trying to… Trying to… She didn't even know what!

They'd never believe her, certainly not Tom's Kool-Aid drinking sycophants, and not anyone else either. Alphard Black, after all, hadn't believed her and he was witnessing it right here and now.

So, Harry just drew in a deep breath and tried to force down the sudden humiliation and anger she felt as she met Tom's smug eyes, "What about our Defense Project?"

Riddle rolled his eyes, he actually had the nerve to roll them, "What about it?"

"You see a lot of me already, don't you, Riddle?" Harry asked, that edge to her voice growing rawer as she felt her face burn and her eyes sting slightly, unable to help the angry tears gathering at their corners, "I can't imagine you'd want to spend more time with me, muggleborn trash, than you have to!"

"Oh, that?" Tom asked, as if he had forgotten all about it, hadn't seen her only a few days ago asking for her help and her time and details about her life that she hadn't wanted to give him, "I figured that out ages ago. Did you really think I'd be so incapable, so incompetent, as to require your help?"

"Funny," Harry said, willing herself to force the tears back into her eyes along with her rage and humiliation at all of this, this absurd little play of his in which Harry was the butt of the joke, and god why did she even care, "That's exactly what I thought."

Laughing, they all laughed at her, stupid little Harry Potter, who would ever think that Tom Riddle would need help with anything. Even if that something was learning about human decency, kindness, and what it meant to be happy and have hope.

God forbid her from thinking, especially in a moment like this, that Tom Riddle wasn't perfectly capable of goodness.

"Yes, well, I am sorry, Evans," Tom said, even reaching to touch his heart as if it wasn't a cold and empty black pit that sucked in everything she had ever loved in her life, "But there's really nothing either of us can do about it."

"Really?" she asked, laughing slightly and shaking her head, "Somehow, Riddle, I really doubt that."

"You think I haven't thought of something?" Tom Riddle asked, but he knew just as well as she did that he had thought too long and too hard about this very moment.

"Well, what if I say no, jackass?" Harry spat at him, pointing a finger towards his chest and wishing for a moment he could just disappear and leave her alone, "What if I say that I don't want yours or anyone else's help?! What the hell will you do then?"

He had the nerve to smile at her, smile apologetically like he really hated to do this to her as well as himself, "Unfortunately, Evans, Slughorn will pin your failings onto me. I'm afraid I can't take no as an answer."

And that was it, that was the moment that Harry really lost it, she laughed, took in this whole absurd scene and threw her hands into the air, ignoring how insane she must look to everyone still standing there and looking at Harry make a jackass of herself like usual, "Alright, you win, you win! You win like you always do, you must be so bloody proud!"

She then motioned towards him, sneering and shaking her head, ignoring the warm tears dripping down her own face, "Look at you though, it's a bloody pyrrhic victory if I've ever seen one."

Malfoy said something to Tom, a smirk on his lips, but Harry didn't mind because Tom Riddle was really looking at her, hearing every word she said and playing close attention if only because Harry was the only bloody one to see this, see him, for what he really was.

"You're utterly pathetic," she said, a pained smile growing on her lips as yet another bitter realization bubbled up inside her, "You are the most pathetic thing I've ever seen in my life. How could I have ever been terrified of you, hate you, when beneath all these layers and costumes and masks is this spineless ridiculous thing who pins the blame on poor old doddering Professor Slughorn?"

She stepped back, still facing them, facing her sneering nonunderstanding audience, the now glaring Tom Riddle gritting his teeth as she spoke the words that even he couldn't deny were true, "And now I know, Tom Riddle, no matter what charade you play at, what mask you put on your face, you will always be this."

She turned, found herself standing in front of Alphard Black, who was looking at her with an expression of pained sympathy, reaching out for her hesitantly, and softly saying, "Evans…"

Harry brushed past him wordlessly, face flushing and eyes still burning and leaking horrible tears, past everyone, friendless, alone, and a laughingstock in this world and every world if she didn't have a scar to hide behind, she left Tom and all the rest of them until she was out of the castle and walking towards the lake.

She was more than late for class, the others were probably only barely getting to their classes on time, but somehow Harry couldn't bring herself to care about one missed class or the detention she was undoubtedly receiving. She'd just… She'd just sit here until it was 1996 again, sit here staring out at the lake and tell herself that it didn't matter what they thought, that she was just the butt of everyone's jokes and Tom Riddle's pointless games, that she might not have ever had a real friend in her life, that even Ron or Hermione or Sirius might not have…

It didn't matter, she'd be gone soon, back to the future, and then there would just be an empty hole where Harry Evans used to sit.

* * *

It seemed natural, that he'd find her by the lake, even in the dark long after classes had ended, dinner as well, and only half an hour before curfew would descend on them. She looked so small, sitting on a log and staring out blindly into the horizon, so small and so pale…

And the anger that had been boiling in him all afternoon at her words and accusations, things she dared to say not only to him but in front of their peers, all through his next class and dinner, evaporated out of him and left something hollow in its place.

He walked closely to her, watched as her back stiffened at his footsteps but still didn't turn to look at him, then he too sat beside her on that same log they'd sat on weeks ago when this had all started. She didn't look at him, just kept staring out into the darkness as if Tom wasn't sitting beside her at all.

"You have detention," Tom said, casually, as if discussing the weather, "This Saturday at seven in the evening, with Professor Dumbledore."

She didn't say a word, still didn't look at him, clearly intent on pretending he wasn't here at all.

"I've never had detention myself," Tom noted, wondering if that would surprise her or wouldn't surprise her at all, "However, I've heard that at worst Professor Dumbledore just tends to have you write lines and perhaps give you a lecture on wasted education and how even one missed class can lead to catastrophe."

He smiled then, thinking on all he knew on the class despite never taking it himself, "Mind you, if you were going to skip one then Divination's not a bad place to start. A fascinating subject, truly, but utter tripe as a course from what I've heard. You wouldn't believe how many times I've now had to hear about Orion Black's erotic dreams of sexual conquest in search for some sign of prophecy. I dearly hope that he doesn't have the gift or else our school is filled with filthy whores."

The silence was as stiff and tense as her posture and Tom felt whatever he might say dying on his tongue, even accusations of her thoughtlessness and her own pathetic nature withered inside of him. And it was so quiet tonight, not a natural sound around them to stifle the lack of noise…

Slowly, hesitantly, almost as if he could barely believe the words himself he said, "I am sorry."

Her head whipped towards him, eyes large and alarmed and he looked at her with his mouth open, wondering if she somehow knew this was the first time he'd ever said that. Ever said that and meant it, that is.

"I'm sorry," he continued, closing his eyes for a moment and forcing himself to continue, "For earlier, in the hallway… You must understand that that's simply the way things are."

Maybe that was why he cold throw out her words so easily, because they had been for the situation, not really for him. Or at least, that was what Tom decided to tell himself, lest he think of how much that last phrase had hurt. Like she'd gone and plunged a knife into his heart.

Why should it matter? He'd thought bitterly to himself at the time, in Arithmancy, why should it matter what Harry Evans thinks or says or does? Who did she think she was and…

And why was it that the only person who even knew him at all, who seemed to know him beyond all reasonable explanations, who could look him in the eye when he was anything other than what he presented, hated the very sight of him?

They'd laughed at her, after she left, thinking it was the worst comeback they'd ever heard to Tom Riddle who really was just being polite. No, not everyone had laughed, Alphard Black had just looked at him, across from Tom, like he'd never seen Tom before in his life.

"The way things are," Harry said bitterly, looking away from him once again, "I know that, I've known that since I first showed up here… Just, I don't understand why there's a show at all?"

She looked back at him, motioned to him like she just couldn't understand him, "You hate me, you should hate me the way you pretend to in front of all your friends. Or, if you don't hate me, you should just go back to your indifference."

She stood then, began to pace, approaching the line of the water and throwing her hands into the air, "Why go through this whole bloody thing, this whole… social rube goldberg machine you've gone and set up, just so that you can laugh at me in the hallway or laugh at me studying Potions when you can do that on your own bloody time?"

Her hands fell to her sides listlessly, as if she just couldn't understand it, and at that lack of understanding Tom did feel his anger, his embarrassment, return as every word out of her mouth should be true and he hated himself because they weren't.

He stood as well, pointed and accused, "You pushed me into this!"

"I what?"

"It wouldn't have come to this if you didn't keep running away from me at every bloody opportunity!" If she didn't flinch each time he entered a room, if she didn't smile every time a wall of people stood between them, eagerly using her own lackluster reputation against him so that he could barely even see her for the gap that existed between them.

"What opportunity?" Harry scoffed, actually laughed, an amused and bitter sound as if she herself didn't even know what this was anymore, "I don't even have to run away if you can't stand to be seen within ten feet of me in public without some lame excuse of authority breathing down your neck."

She looked at him, shaking her head and crossing her arms, "I don't even have to run, Riddle, all I have to do is safely surround myself with other people."

He wanted to deny this, wanted to damn her for being so observant when she had no right to be, but before he could even open her mouth she asked, "Can you really cast a patronus now or were you feeling particularly emasculated in front of all your cool friends?"

"Emasculated," he asked, tone short and done before he sneered, "There's nothing emasculated about it, I figured it out last weekend if you must know. Surely, you didn't think I'd be so incompetent as to fail to do something you yourself can so easily."

"Really?" Harry asked, in a tone that implied she didn't believe him at all.

Just for that he went through the motions, not even having to conjure her, his realization about her in his mind because like it or not she was standing in front of him. Just as wide-eyed and clearly seeing as ever, even with the fear and the dislike, standing toe to toe with him in a lake in a mid-autumn evening, " _Expecto Patronum!_ "

The snake proudly emerged from his wand, dark and silver and glorious, and at the sight of it Harry Evans took a step towards it, seeming at once both shocked, happy, and miserable.

"You really did it," she whispered, looking at the snake which moved towards her outstretched hands, its nose nuzzling against them "Tom Marvolo Riddle has made a patronus."

"I thought you'd be delighted," Tom said, the patronus fading back into the dark and leaving only the two of them behind.

"I am," Harry insisted, turning to look towards him with a strange blank look on her face, "But… Have you ever had a moment, where you've been perhaps waiting for something, a sign, and then it happens, and it feels like the world itself is crashing down on your shoulders?"

Before he could stop himself, he laughed and admitted, "Yes, I met you."

She thought he was joking, he could tell by the way she smiled, how she huffed out a small bitter laugh. Perhaps it was for the best, he thought to himself, because he never should have gone admitting something like that to her in the first place.

Whatever it was she was feeling she seemed to be pushing it down, or perhaps coming to some unknown realization again, something hidden from his sight.

"I am glad, Riddle," she looked over at him, offering him a sly grin, "One less real reason to talk to one another, right mate? Your reputation safely intact."

She then began to walk away, oddly enough not towards the castle but instead off towards the groundkeeper's cottage. Tom called after her, "Evans, where are you going?"

Honestly, did she want another bloody detention?

She stopped, turned and gave him a strangely assessing look, then, a sly grin overtook her pretty features and she cried back to him, "I'm going to go and open the chamber of secrets!"

* * *

 **Author's Note: Tom is high maintenance but he thinks he's low maintenance. And yes, as you can imagine, things are going to get... interesting next chapter. And so many feelings! And someone talking besides Tom and Harry! So many things happening! What are we going to do with all of this ridiculousness?**

 **Thanks for reading, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	6. Chapter 6

" _You see? That is just like you, Harry. You say things like that, and you make it impossible for me to hate you."_

When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _October, 1942_

* * *

It was strange, but when the end came, as it always did every year, there would be a moment where she wouldn't be afraid.

Just for a moment, she would stand in the eye of the hurricane, and all the fear, all the rage, all the terror, anguish, despair, hopelessness, and helplessness would melt away until something new, something quintessentially Harry Potter and yet not Harry Potter at all, would stand in her place.

Her first year it had been the icy and bitter taste of the potion in her throat, stepping through the flames past Ron and Hermione, to face what at the time she thought would be Snape and her destiny against the final task guarding the philosopher's stone.

Her second, that moment she'd looked at the ghostly Tom Riddle and realized that he was destroying Ginny Weasley, would destroy her as well with a basilisk even now speeding its way towards her, and that he was not such an unfamiliar specter after all.

It was usually at the very end, that last moment of rational thought, where she would stare death itself in the face, and she would feel so much older and so very unlike herself, and she would think that if this was the end, if this was to be the end of Harry Potter, then it was already written and perhaps not such a bad way to exit the world.

Tonight, was different.

There had been no build up over an entire school year, no unfurling mystery, no demands that the task somehow fell to Harry and Harry alone, more there was even the thought that she didn't have to do this, shouldn't do it even for fear of corrupting a time line that already seemed so very corrupted.

Yet as soon as the words had mockingly slipped out of her mouth to Tom Riddle, as soon as her feet had headed towards the groundkeeper's hut, no, as soon as she saw that bright silver light in the form of a snake (because of course it was a bloody snake) there'd been no sense of taking any of it back.

The calm, the eye of the hurricane, was suddenly upon her and it didn't matter that curfew had come and passed her by, that she now had startled roosters transfigured as beads inside of her pocket, that other than a few roosters she didn't have a sword and didn't have a phoenix and didn't have a prayer of success, that no one was screaming at her and no one was dying yet and she had every reason to turn around and head inside.

There was just the thought that somewhere inside of her head, in a place that she hadn't looked, she'd promised herself that if Tom Riddle could change, could give her hope and somehow have hope himself, then she had to have hope enough in the world to change it.

And if that was the path into damnation, well, then so be it.

This was what Harry did, she thought as she crossed the grounds into Hogwarts, darting behind pillars and avoiding prefects and professors while she made her way down, down, down to the dungeons bathroom. Even more than being the girl who lived, being the freak cousin in the cupboard, or the strange girl out of place and time in Hogwarts, she fought monsters.

Some part of her should laugh at that, she thought, because Harry had always wanted so badly to be ordinary, to be just Harry Potter. Well, here was her chance, a whole bucket of excuses, no expectations or glory or fame whatsoever and, "And I'm throwing it away."

With that she was inside the bathroom, dark in the middle of the night, a quiet lumos from Harry's wand the only source of light in the place. With a grim expression and her heartbeat steadily increasing like a drum of war in her chest, she approached the sink, searched for that tell-tale faucet.

"Oh, there you are, you little bastard," Harry said as her eyes landed on it, just out of place enough to notice but never out of place enough to earn a second glance, that faucet with the snake subtly engraved on the side.

Staring at it, she licked her lips, looking around the bathroom and towards the door just to double check. Everything was still quiet, everything still empty, Harry breathed out and fixed her eyes on the faucet, looking at the shape and thinking of snakes, " _Open._ "

Just as before, in 1992, fifty years from now, there was a rumbling then the head of the structure lifted, the basins and faucets moving apart to reveal that dark pit, the stone pipes, like a well that had been forgotten by time. She looked down, still appearing as bottomless as ever, frowning down into the darkness.

"Well," she said to herself, "At least I know I'll survive the bloody fall."

Still, she stared, it hadn't exactly been fun falling down there the first time. Granted they hadn't broken anything, and neither had Lockhart, and she'd gone on to kill a basilisk so she clearly couldn't have been too injured, but she'd had a devil of a time getting back up again.

Plus, now that she was thinking about it, she just couldn't picture Tom Riddle jumping down there. Not only because he could kill himself, which seemed like, well, the opposite of what Tom Riddle wanted to do on any occasion, but also because it was so… undignified.

Tom Marvolo Riddle did not jump into mysterious pits in the ladies' bathroom, thank you very much.

"Wait a minute," Harry said to herself at that thought, "How the bloody hell did he find it the first time around?"

She'd never asked the diary, somehow the subject had never come up, but it was in the girl's lavatory. Had he really been searching around the girl's lavatory looking for this thing? Or was he just, for some weird reason, inside the girl's lavatory and somehow looking closely at all the faucets and said to himself, "Hey, that one looks like a bloody snake, I better whisper sweet nothings to it."

Harry grimaced, "You know, on second thought, I don't think I want to know."

Then, looking down at the pit, thinking of snakes and her snake friend from the zoo, she hissed that word she'd always wanted to try in retrospect but obviously never had a need or chance to, " _Stairs_ "

The pit remained a stubborn pit, no stairs in sight, probably understandable since snakes, well, didn't really have stairs.

"Alright, no stairs," Harry said to herself, nodding slowly, like this was all just part of the plan, "That's fine, now think, you're Tom Riddle sneaking around the school and coming in and out of this place, and you have to get out of this pit somehow without being noticed by anyone. How do you do it?"

Harry waited, stood there waiting for her brain or the furniture to come up with an answer, and neither did because neither of them were Tom Riddle. Harry was just left with a dull sort of headache and the thought that, maybe, Tom Riddle was much cleverer than she was and that she should be sort of embarrassed about that.

She grimaced, looking around, and haunted by the memories that without Fawkes she and Ron really would have been stuck in there for… Well, she didn't know how long, maybe until they died and Lockhart along with them.

"Merlin's balls," Harry cursed, then, looking heavenward and deciding that there was probably nothing for it and that if she succeeded anyways then there was nothing Tom could do, well, besides try to kill her the old-fashioned way, she transfigured her shoe briefly into a marker, writing on the mirror of one of the sinks, "If Harry Evans isn't seen for…"

She paused, thought of some number, thought of when she'd really start panicking, "A day or so, go get Tom Riddle (no matter what he says or how much he whines), have him look at all the sinks, and say open to the one that looks like a snake. Then bring rope, a lot of rope… I really do mean a lot of rope."

She then signed it, "Harry Lily Evans" and cast a sticking charm on the words, hoping that no one would overreact and do anything about it until, well, it was time to overreact and do something about it.

It said a lot, Harry thought, that she had to rely on Tom Riddle to potentially save her ass in any capacity. Hopefully though, she'd manage to figure a way out of her before that point. With that, and a deep breath, she jumped down into the pit.

"Oh," she said as she landed on the basilisk's shed skin, "Oh, this is just as gross and terrible as I remember."

Shuddering, she picked herself up off the ground, brushing off her skirt and looking down at her clothes, "I should have changed, dammit, Harry, you should have changed!"

She only had one Hogwarts uniform and leave it to her to go and ruin it with giant snakes, rat bones, and god only knew what else. Well, too late for that she supposed as she looked back up from whence she came.

Looking up grimly, at the faint distant source of light, she called out, " _Close!_ "

There was a shuddering, rumbling, then even that was gone and all that remained was the lumos of Harry's wand. There, now it wouldn't be stumbled on by Myrtle or even Tom Riddle. All that was left to do now was wander through the pipes and let old memories surface, yes there was the place where Lockhart had betrayed them and then wiped his own memories, there was where the rocks had fallen and separated her from Ron…

"And there," Harry said as she came across the vault door guarded by serpents, "Is my friend the creepy manhole."

Concentrating, staring at the snakes, she again said, " _Open_ "

She watched as the metal snakes retreated, the outer snake circling them, bracing herself for whatever was on the other side, and then it was open and Harry was vaulting down that familiar, water lined walkway, guarded by statues of serpents with Salazar Slytherin's statue face at the end.

Only, this time, there was no dying Ginny set upon the floor in the center where the light could hit her pale face, and no Tom Riddle watching her die from the shadows.

Just Harry, for the first time, it really was just Harry.

She reached into her pocket, fingered the rooster-beads as she tried to control her breathing and the runaway beating of her heart, "Come on, Harry, you've nearly died so many times now that it shouldn't even phase you anymore. You've even nearly died from this, and you made it out then, you can do this."

She breathed out, walked towards the altar, towards the mouth of the man's face that would open and reveal the basilisk, and when she was at the end she called out, closing her eyes and saying, " _Open_ "

The mouth grated open, and at first there was nothing, just her standing so still and so human and so afraid, then the sound of slithering movement and a voice, " _Who wakes us_?"

There was nowhere to hide just as there had been nowhere to hide in 1992, when she could only turn and run, run as she heard it gaining on her with a dreadful hungry hiss, run to the other distant end of the hallway only to slip on the wet pavement and fall forward with Tom's laughter ringing in her ears.

Without a word, Harry transfigured the roosters, all of them, and began to book it down the hallway. They clucked, the basilisk, emerging from the mouth, gave out a great wordless hiss of rage and betrayal, all while Harry screamed in her head for them to crow, crow goddammit, crow!

The hiss grew greater, the clucking louder, then suddenly there was no clucking at all but crunching and a rumble and hiss as a great body turned to look towards her retreating figure, and this time there was no Fawkes, there was no sword, there were only dead roosters and Harry gave out a cry as she fell to the ground once again, slipping in the same spot that she had in 1992.

And then a shadow over her, a great dark shadow and the feeling of heat from gaping jaws, and her own last moment of horrified laughter and the thought that, she really was such a fool.

It had hurt the first time, it had hurt so badly the first time she'd been stabbed with a basilisk fang, but it was nothing compared to the second. And everything went dark so quickly, she couldn't even stumble to her grave, just twitch and spirt and scream as her body was broken in half and Harry Potter just like that ceased to exist.

* * *

Except, sometimes Harry managed to surprise even Harry.

* * *

Harry's eyes opened, she gasped, shuddered and tried to sit up with great pain feel like she'd just been run over by five semi-trucks in a row. She groaned, looked around blearily as she rolled onto her knees, grabbed her wand, and pushed herself through sheer force of will into a standing position.

Then, with a cry she moved back in horror, surprise and terror, as there, right next to where her head had just been, was the basilisk. Or, rather, what was left of the basilisk.

Harry peered closer at it, "What the bloody hell?"

It was… It looked almost as if it had been burned, cooked from the inside out, where its eyes had been were now two charred holes and even now its body was left as a steaming charred wreck, and god she could even smell it cooking. Taking a few steps back, bile rising in her throat, she noted that there was…

"Blood," Harry said to herself as she took it in, "Oh god, my blood"

And it was everywhere, it looked, it looked as if it was all of it, all the blood that had ever been in there was there in a giant puddle on the floor, like she'd just started gushing like a fountain and…

And Harry held a hand to her mouth, trying to contain the vomit, even while her other hand gently poked at her stomach, at all her body parts, trying to find the wounds. Except, finally standing up straight, stretching and feeling every part of her, there was nothing there. Nothing except exhaustion, a heavy desire to sleep forever and never wake up, soreness but…

"Jesus, Mary, and Joseph," Harry whispered almost reverently, "I am bloody Jesus Christ."

She laughed, a startled horrified laugh, looking around to see if anyone else had seen had… Had watched as Harry had risen from the bloody grave and somehow lit a basilisk on fire at the same time. She shook her head, just waiting for it to resurrect herself or for Harry to go back to being dead or…

She looked down at her wand, across at the snake, nodding to herself slowly as she said, "Accidental magic, you just… You accidentally fried the bastard, Harry, and you hit your head and just thought it was eating you because that's what probably would have happened. Except, you know, you hit your head when you slipped. You are concussed, you are concussed and you have killed a giant snake…"

She then looked around, spotted feathers, her nodding becoming more certain as she said, "And all the roosters, and the blood isn't yours, it's the roosters, because it ate all the damn roosters and you should have seen that coming. But you didn't, but that's okay Harry, because you just saved your own bacon by hitting yourself on the head. Good show, Harry, maybe we can try that next time with Voldemort, he'll never see it bloody coming."

She laughed, hand darting to her mouth as if to contain the noise and her growing, manic, smile. She had to get it together, she had to get it together and get back out and, oh, maybe go to the hospital wing. Except they'd take one look at her, at her ruined uniform (and god it was torn in half and was that rooster blood?) and ask what happened and what would she say then?

She could handle a concussion, besides, she knew who she was and what she'd just been doing as well as the year (which was pretty impressive given all the time travel), so it couldn't be that bad. She just… She couldn't sleep for a while, that was right, you didn't sleep for a while and you tried not think or be in bright places and stare at screens and then you'd be fine.

With that, slowly, so slowly, walking like she'd been hit by a bus as well as feeling like it, she made her way to the end of the walkway, up the ladder, then through the dark tunnels falling apart, and finally, to the entrance to the chamber.

"Oh Merlin," Harry said as she craned her neck upwards, ignoring the numerous kinks in it, "I forgot about that."

She looked up with abject despair, crying out, " _Stairs!_ "

Nothing, not a shudder, not a single twitch.

" _Stairs?!_ "

* * *

"Myrtle," Tom said, trying to hold onto that semblance of kindness, a task that was proving rather trying today as he called out sweetly, "Myrtle, it's getting awfully close to curfew again."

There was no answer, only horrified squeaking and stifled sobbing, as if she was somehow making herself quiet enough that Tom couldn't hear her from just outside the bathroom.

Myrtle Warren, funny how no one had warned him, on becoming prefect, about the Myrtle bloody Warrens of the world. He was sure there was one in every year, or at least one in every two, and here was Tom paying society for that prefect badge with change.

By standing outside of the dungeons girl's restroom, late at night once again, trying to politely reassure little mudblood Warren that she was not so despicable that she needed to spend her nights crying in a public restroom because that Olive Hornby was just so mean to her. The girl wasn't even one of his (for good reason, they would have eaten her alive in Slytherin), this was Black's responsibility, and yet here he was again cleaning up everyone else's messes.

Not to mention that Tom was doubly on edge today as, after marching off in the wrong direction like an utter moron, Harry Evans had apparently decided to skip every single one of her classes the next day. He kept waiting, waiting past when the professors noted to him in stern quiet voices that she'd earned two more detentions for two more missed classes, and that perhaps Tom should reach out and talk to her and see if she was alright, the poor girl, but she'd never arrived.

Not at dinner either.

Nor in the library afterward or even by the lake…

It was as if she'd disappeared entirely, left Hogwarts entirely, and his stomach had churned at the thought and the strange, uncomfortable, unfamiliar, concern that something had happened to her. He'd just watched her walk off, laughing at her little joke (the chamber of secrets, honestly, how would someone like Harry Evans find the chamber of secrets in only a month of even being in Hogwarts) and he'd just let her vanish, and now he had no idea what had happened to her even as he suspected that he was the last to have seen her.

God, she could have gone into the Forbidden Forest and been kidnapped by centaurs or eaten by one of that third year Gryffindor Rubeus Hagrid's monstrous pets. If she was gone tomorrow or even after he got back to the common room he'd have to go to Slughorn and tell him that he thought she wasn't just sulking but was missing and…

Point being, that Tom was anxious, on edge, and not in the mood to placate little girls who really were the waste of space that Olive Hornby thought they were.

"Myrtle, I would hate to have to assign you detention for breaking curfew," Tom said, a note of his own impatience and irritation now entering his voice. Unfortunately, this had the opposite effect that he wanted as the sobbing just became louder.

"Don't make me come in there, Myrtle," he threatened, the girl squeaking at the very idea of Tom entering the girl's lavatory, "I will do it and drag you out if I have to."

"No!" she cried out, her voice wracked with sobs and barely intelligible, "Please don't, Tom, I… I'm fine… I'll leave…"

Tom looked towards the ceiling, wondering if it could sympathize with his plight, then started in, "I'll give you to the count of ten, Myrtle. One, two, three, four…"

Louder sobbing, louder shrieking protestations, "Please, don't, I'll come out, you don't have to…"

"Five, six, seven," at no sign of the girl he faced the nearly empty restroom, mentally preparing himself to abandon all dignity and just get this bloody over with, "Eight, nine ten."

He stepped inside, moved to the only occupied stall, pushing in and discovering that, of course, it was locked, "Myrtle, I'm in the restroom, and for every minute that I have to stand in here I'm going to dock ten points from Ravenclaw."

She shrieked again, no, it was really more like a high-pitched sort of moan. She really had earned her name, Tom thought, Moaning Myrtle had such a bloody ring to it. After a moment of insufferable wailing, she seemed to realize that she'd have to come out eventually, and the door opened a crack, revealing the sniffling, four eyed, plain little girl.

"There," Tom asked, holding out his hands as if in offering, "Was that so hard?"

"I'm…" the girl sniffed, wiping at her eyes, "I'm so sorry!"

"Perhaps," Tom said shortly, "You should chat with some of your housemates, get this… sorted out."

Granted, he doubted she could. If anything, every time she opened her mouth she just provided them more ammunition, but if it would stop her from hanging in here and Tom having to get her out then by all bloody means he was in favor of it.

She just nodded, fervently as if she didn't want to think about it, as if she knew just as well as he did that there was no way a mere talking to would stop them from destroying her verbally, inch by inch.

He looked away from her, couldn't repress rolling his eyes towards the ceiling again, was just about to leave when he stopped, noticed writing from some kind of muggle pen on the mirror. He moved closer to it, read the words, eyes lingering on Harry's name, "Myrtle, how long has this been here?"

Myrtle shrugged, "I don't know, it was here this morning, whoever it was used a sticking charm, so nobody could get it off."

Tom stared at it, at his name, and coldly asked, "And you didn't think, perhaps, to come and find me like the note said?"

Myrtle shrugged again, shaking her head, this time looking a bit upset, tears appearing in the corner of her eyes again, "I… I don't know… I thought it was a joke and that…"

Tom no longer paid her any mind instead, as Harry instructed so casually, as if it had been a bloody afterthought, looked at the faucets until finally he found the one with a snake engraved on the side.

He traced it, the detail of its scales, even of its eyes, then looked in the mirror and said, "Myrtle, why don't you head back to your dorm?"

"But I…"

"If you leave now I won't have to dock you any house points," Tom said, and that seemed to be enough as the girl flushed, then scampered out of the bathroom, leaving Tom and the mirrors alone.

He stared at his reflection for a moment and it was… Haggard, strangely haggard, rawer than he ever let himself appear inside of this castle. Even in his reflection, in the dim lighting, his eyes burned so bright and so pale.

Then he looked down at the snake again, tracing it reverently, and hissed out in that strange tongue that only he and the snakes seemed to speak, " _Open_ "

He stepped back, watching with a strange smile, a laugh, as the sinks began to move and reveal a dark hole, a concrete pipe, and a bottom which couldn't be seen.

Then, a gloriously familiar, if tired and strained, voice, "Riddle, is that you up there?"

And it was like, it was like something released inside of him, something broke and rose upward and made him want to laugh and slump with relief in a way that he never had before.

He looked down, blinking, trying to see her, to see her bright green eyes and her ridiculous smile (the smile she never seemed to give to him but he always wished she would) as she looked up at him, "Harry?"

A pause, almost embarrassed, and he could practically see her flushing and pouting as she purposefully looked away from him, "Yeah, it's me."

He looked around, looked back down, then asked, "How the bloody hell did you get down there?!"

Of course, maybe the question was how didn't she get down there? Because of course, of course somehow Harry Evans would manage to fall into a mysterious hole in the dungeon bathroom after only a month. A hole that Tom had never even known existed after years of going to this school.

"Well," Harry paused, the silence strained and rather awkward, until she finished lamely, "It's kind of a long story. Look, Riddle, do you mind helping me up?"

"Well, certainly," Tom said, leaning dangerously over the hole now as he tried, in vain, to make her out, "But it would help if I could see you."

" _Lumos_ " a cry, and then he could see her, a great white light from the tip of her wand illuminating her a good distance below him, and he paled at the sight of her. Her Hogwarts uniform was ripped to shred, more, parts were concerningly stained with some dark substance, her hair was even more out of control than usual, her face and skin streaked with dirt and what looked like blood…

"Harry," he breathed, "What happened?"

She grimaced, looked down at herself then looked back up, "Do I really look that bad?"

He didn't answer, just leaned back, pointing his wand down at her, "I'm going to levitate you out, try not to move, you'll just end up hitting the walls."

"Oh, don't move," Harry said, nodding slowly, too slowly and stiffly, like nodding pained her, "I can do that."

Grimacing, Tom said the spell, then slowly, carefully, guided harry upwards through the dark pit and then into the restroom where she all but collapsed into his arms. He gripped her tightly, prevented her from falling back into the hole even as he moved them both away from it, trying not to note that she smelled like stagnant water and like blood, like so much blood.

"Thanks, Tom," she muttered against his ear, skin cold, "For a minute, I was in some real trouble down there."

Tom said nothing, just looked back at the hole, the… the entrance, and said quietly in the snake's tongue, " _Close._ "

The sinks shuddered, then slowly but surely, moved back into place once more. And when it was done, when the bathroom was normal once again, he breathed, his hands shaking. For a moment, for probably too long, he just held her, and quietly he asked, "Harry, was that the chamber of secrets?"

She stiffened, tried to pull back, probably to look him in the eye or else try to hold her wand against him but he just held her tighter, to the point where he might be bruising her, he was holding her that tightly.

Finally, she muttered, "That's not important."

"Harry, was that the chamber of secrets? Did you find, did you find and open the chamber of secrets?!"

She tilted her head back at him, an odd smile on her face, one exhausted, mirthful, and almost sly as if she knew the words she was about to say would break his heart, "It doesn't matter, it's gone, Riddle."

"What's gone?"

"Your basilisk," she said with a pained, almost mad, laugh, "It's gone."

He looked down at her, at the blood, at her dazed eyes, a strange impossible conclusion beginning to form inside of his head, and he said, "Oh, oh no, tell me you didn't."

"Well," Harry said slowly pushing away from him, from his now lax and horrified fingers as she supported herself on the sink, "I kind of did, it's what I do, it's… It's who I am."

In even the dim light of the bathroom, he thought, she looked so much worse than she had in that dark pit.

"Harry, tell me you didn't face a basilisk, Slytherin's five-hundred-year-old basilisk, down there."

She just looked at him, tilted her head, like this was the first time she'd ever seen him before, "Aren't you going to try and kill me?"

"Kill you?!" he asked, motioning towards her, the heat of his anger returning like a lightning bolt out of a blue sky at her constant ridiculous thoughtlessness, "Why should I kill you when you do such a damn fine job of it yourself!"

"I opened your chamber," she said slowly, like she was dragging the words out from somewhere inside of her head with monumental effort, "I killed… I killed your snake."

He moved towards her, mouth opening, wanting to demand how she knew this, how she knew any of this about him or would even suspect it, how she'd found this place in only a month and why she was so… herself, but all he could do was envelop her in another bone crushing hug and say, "You stupid woman, I've never been down there I… What would I do in this bloody school without you?"

She patted him on the back awkwardly, tried to remove herself again before giving up and just hanging limply in his arms, finally she said, "Jesus, Riddle, I'm going to have nightmares about this."

"Good," Tom said shortly, not moving an inch, "You should suffer as I suffer, I'm going to be having bloody nightmares about this as well."

"No, really," Harry said slowly, almost with disbelief, "Am I in some parallel universe where you're, I don't know, a human being? Or… Oh my god, I am dead, this is hell, I am in hell. Hell is Tom Riddle giving you hugs."

He laughed, he couldn't stop it, it bubbled up from him like a gushing river and out through his mouth and the shaking of his chest, because it struck him that he would have killed anyone else, that he maybe would have killed her only a few weeks ago, but that now...

Now all he could do was laugh and thank the god he didn't believe in that she was somehow alive, alive and finding chambers of secrets in the dungeon girl's bathroom and skipping classes to slay monsters.

All the rage he should have had, rightfully deserved, all of it was gone and there was only this strange overpowering relief and yes, yes, even happiness. And somehow, even though he knew that he should, that he'd probably think differently tomorrow, and rage and hate and feel ashamed that of all the people in the world, of all the far more noble and dignified and worthy people it was her, he didn't even wish to summon the anger.

He moved back from her, much to Harry's slumping relief, but kept his hands on her shoulders, "Did you somehow blow up the whole chamber?"

She frowned, blinked, "Well, no…"

"Then we can come back tomorrow," he said, real excitement in his voice at the thought of it, not just exploring his ancestry on his own but somehow with strange, unbelievable, Harry Evans there with him, before adding with the charming smile she always hated, "Besides, I never wanted a basilisk in the first place. I hear they're very high maintenance."

"Oh," Harry said as she shook her head, eyes wide with stunned disbelief, "Hell is bloody weird."

"In the meantime," Tom said, a hand in the small of her back as he ushered her out of the restroom, keeping her same tired and worn pace, "We take you to the hospital wing."

"No, no, I'm fine," Harry protested weakly, entirely too weakly to convince Tom, "What would we even tell them?!"

"Well," Tom said, eyebrows raised as he took her in, "Perhaps we can just tell them that you fell off the back of a truck."

* * *

 **Author's Note: Expect Tom's delayed rage, confusion, shame, and indignation next chapter as well as Harry's ridiculous denial and deflections and absurd excuses and sob stories concocted between her and Tom. I love this story entirely too much. And yes, friends, things will only get more ridiculous from here.**

 **Thanks for reading and reviewing, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.**


	7. Chapter 7

" _Well, if you must know, it was because he was very jealous, and I had these days of the week underpants."_

" _Ehhh. I'm sorry. I need the judges ruling on this, 'Days of the week underpants'?"_

" _Yes, they had days of the week on them, and I thought they were sort of funny. And then, one day, Sheldon says to me, 'You never wear Sunday.' It was all suspicious. Where was Sunday? Where had I left Sunday? And I told him, and he didn't believe me."_

" _What?"_

" _They don't make Sunday."_

" _Why not?"_

" _Because of God."_

When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _October, 1942_

* * *

Harry had never been particularly great at lying. This was a real problem as Harry also had never been particularly great at keeping herself out of trouble and not facing certain doom on an annual basis. So, when Harry, honest to God, would try to be sneaky about her investigating Sirius Black or the heir of Slytherin or whatever, it'd usually just end up in some performance so pitiable that the other person would just choose to look the other way so that Harry could maintain some of her dignity.

Well, except for Malfoy that one time in second year when Harry had been pretending to be Goyle, and he'd asked if Goyle's mother, after dropping him on his head the first time when he was an infant, had been so shocked he was still alive and drooling at the mouth that she'd gone and dropped him a second time.

(It made you wonder, if twelve-year-old Malfoy had had biting wit like that, why he always resorted to, "My father will hear about this, Potter!" around her? Before then she'd always thought it was just because he couldn't come up with anything less lame.)

Cedric though had been very polite, well, polite and possibly flirtatious as he suggested she use the prefect's bath because it had such a roomy jacuzzi and she'd be sure to find out "some interesting things". Which then had led Harry to the false hope that maybe Cedric Diggory, Adonis among Hufflepuffs, was interested in her (in a slightly creepy way, but hey, Harry could hut tub as much as the next girl even with a screeching egg brought along). Which in turn led Harry to babbling at him in December and asking him out to the Yule Ball. Which then had led to her being shot down and rejected without mercy as Cedric Diggory announced, sorry Harry, but I already have a girlfriend, you probably know her, Cho Chang. Which then of course had left Harry with no other choice but to ask Ron who was mostly still shocked and pissed that Hermione was going with Viktor Krum.

And then Cedric had died, just like that, and she…

Well, she tried not to think about it.

The long and short being, lying and Harry were not on particularly agreeable terms, even though by all accounts they should be. Tom Riddle though, man, he was something else.

Here was Harry, looking and feeling like death, half convinced she probably was dead (because Tom Riddle, Voldemort, Voldemort and hugging, Voldemort and not angry over dead snake, Voldemort and hugging) but trying to make the most of her now patently surreal existence, and there was Tom spinning this ridiculous story to the school nurse about how Harry the idiot had gone and had some sort of a dramatic fainting spell at the edge of a window on her way to Divination and then gone and tumbled out of the castle and impaled herself on a few well-placed rocks.

Tom, the dashing hero performing his regular prefect duties, had found her just now as she had gurgled in pain and despair having somehow been hidden by bushes and not seen by any other student or the groundskeeper for two days, had fixed her up as best he could, and rushed her to the hospital wing.

Harry wouldn't have bought a word of it. She wasn't sure if Tom or anyone else knew, but Harry was not too shabby at athletics, certainly she was coordinated enough not to fall out of a window and plummet to her death. Neville wasn't even that uncoordinated, and he'd nearly killed himself in potions three dozen times over!

Still, he was just so… earnest about it that it was like it took real effort to even question what he was saying. Like you had to look at him and not want to believe him for whatever reason. Which, she supposed nobody else had a reason to, Harry really only did because of the chamber.

When it'd come to meeting the diary, she'd been just as much of a fool as everyone else.

Then again, she supposed the actual truth of Harry Evans climbing in to a secret pit beneath the castle and murdered Salazar Slytherin's racist basilisk only to concuss herself, douse herself in rooster blood, burn the snake alive with accidental magic, and trap herself down there until someone went and told Tom Riddle to get her out already was hardly more believable.

Besides, even though she hadn't really had a chance to look at herself, she probably did look like she'd fallen out of several windows let alone just the one. Who knew roosters had so much blood in them? No wonder Tom Riddle had been able to write giant ominous rhyming messages all over the walls.

"Oh, you poor dear," the nurse said, with far more sympathy than Madame Pomfrey who by Harry's fifth year had turned into a draconian task master who was done with Harry's medical emergency shenanigans and pushed Harry gently onto a bed as she ran her wand over her with familiar diagnostic spell work.

There was something in her eyes too, something more than pity, something that seemed to really look at Harry and was almost torn in half just looking at her. It was the look, Harry thought, that Sirius had given her when he'd told her that she couldn't live with him after all.

Except why would that be on her face?

More, on seeing the nurse looking at her, Tom reached out and tenderly patted her hand. Giving Harry almost an identical look as the nurse. Well, as close to it as he could pull off, which given it was Tom Riddle was pretty damn close to the real deal.

Harry felt like she was missing something here. Like something important had been said without her even noticing. Except what could be so important about Harry being stupid or clumsy or something enough to fall out a window?

"Yeah," Harry said lamely, not sure if she wanted to go ahead and agree that she was a poor dear. She'd had worse, strangely enough, but she was still sore and kind of hungry. In fact, she was hungrier at this point than she was sore, it wasn't quite the Dursley level of hunger (which actually would ebb and flow as her body would settle into routine starvation) but it was approaching that nasty pang that came with the first few days of summer where she had to get used to eating Dudders' scraps again after having been living the dream at Hogwarts.

Head hitting the pillow, eyes fluttering as sweet oblivion beckoned, she then asked, "So, I heard I have a lot of detention, since I missed classes. Considering I fell out of a window can I… not have those?"

The woman looked over at her, brown eyes sharp and suddenly looking entirely too much like Madame Pomfrey, "If they just try to assign you detention, my dear, there will be words."

"Oh, good," Harry said rather lamely before nodding towards Tom, "Can you pass the word up the chain then?"

He smiled at her, that odd amused and even fond thing, took a seat next to her bed then squeezed her hand reassuringly, "I'll try."

Harry, with hesitation and a bit of a grimace, pried her hand out of his. She might have concussed herself, but she wasn't that far gone yet. He frowned at this, something dark and rather flat entering his eyes, but it faded before she could really get a good look.

The wand above her stopped, the diagnostic light at the end flickering out, the nurse turned to look at Tom with a bit of an odd look, "Mr. Riddle did you…"

"Yes?" he asked, and god even as tired as she was Harry just found it… It was such a him face to make, that ridiculous goody-goody face that he made to every professor (but especially Slughorn) that just had Harry kind of wanting to vomit all over everything.

"Other than low blood sugar and a bit of dehydration, Miss Potter is perfectly fine," the nurse said, now with a bit of awe as she took in the tattered and blood-stained remains of Harry's uniform that hinted at some serious lethal shenanigans, "I wouldn't expect this kind of work from a professional."

"Oh," Tom said, mouth falling open in surprise that Harry suspected was at least a little genuine, "I see."

The words were flat, almost disappointed and uncomfortable, like he'd never been praised for something he hadn't done before. Or at least, never been praised for something he hadn't intended to steal credit for anyway.

The nurse now gave him a rather considering look though, appreciative, "Have you thought about joining the medical profession? With talent like yours…"

"Oh, no, I'm afraid that I…" he paused, clearly tried to think of some excuse, then said, "The sight of blood is very difficult for me."

Harry started to choke on her own spit, eyes bugging out as she was suddenly wide awake at the idea of Voldemort being squeamish.

At that he glanced over at Harry, seemed to remember that she was covered in the stuff, and blanched as he admitted, "It was very difficult to get Miss Potter back into the castle."

Harry, wheezing, forced herself into an upright position, waving off the nurse's concerned looks (and was it just Harry or was she looking really concerned considering that Harry was supposed to be fine), "Oh, great, then can I… Go? You know, back to my dorm…"

The nurse paused, looked at Harry, really looked closely at her then glanced towards Tom who, after a moment's pause, nodded his head. Like it was all good to take Harry back to her dorm now because Tom was going to watch her like a good babysitter. Which, what the hell? Well, she supposed the cover story was her falling out the window but still, they could trust her to climb stairs by herself!

Apparently, Tom's minimal authority as Slytherin prefect decided it as the nurse, with a small frown, stood and summoned from the medicine cabinet a vial of some green potion that smelled like cat vomit, "Not until you drink this."

Squeezing her eyes shut Harry chugged it down like a true veteran of the hospital wing. The effects were almost immediate, the cotton mouth was gone, that dull ache in her stomach subsided, and the lead weight of exhaustion was lifted off her sinuses.

Suddenly she felt like… Well, better than she had in a long time.

She hopped up off the bed, grinned at the nurse and offered a small, "Thanks, you know, for seeing me this late and everything."

Then she was practically skipping out the door of the hospital wing, only, unsurprisingly, Tom stated to the nurse in a quiet and truly concerned tone, "I'll make sure to walk her back."

And whatever elation Harry had felt disappeared in some hole in her stomach. She wasn't sure if she wanted to groan, cry, or run away. It was easy, spending all day in a pit wondering if anyone would ever come to find her or if she should try climbing up the slick walls herself, to let these concerns drift from her.

Even when he'd pulled her out everything had seemed so fuzzy and distant and well… not real at all that she hadn't been too concerned.

Now, however, as they walked down, down, and down again towards the dungeons, she felt sobering reality dripping back into her. He must have felt it as well, she thought, because his frown grew with every step and so did the dull anger in his eyes that she'd expected from the beginning.

Why it hadn't been there in the first place she guessed she'd never know.

They were about halfway down when he finally asked it, "How did you manage to get into the chamber of secrets?"

He stopped on the staircase, not seeming to care that it'd move again in about five minutes, and just stared down at her from a truly intimidating height. Then, his voice growing lower and colder, he asked, "How did you even find it in the first place?"

Harry paled, her heartbeat rising again like had about a day before now in the chamber. Those were two questions that she was never going to answer, not to him, and not to anyone else here either.

"I don't know," she said, a bit too stiffly, but it wasn't really said to fool him. Tom Riddle was many things, many terrible things, but he wasn't stupid.

"You don't know?" he asked with a small, disbelieving, laugh, "Really."

"Does it really matter?" Harry asked instead, turning her body sideways to dismiss him but to also keep him in her line of sight, "I found it, I got in, that's the end of…"

"It's my birthright!" he hissed out, but in the dead silence of the castle it almost seemed to echo, was louder than it should have been, "It's my history, my legacy, and you've taken it away from me!"

Harry raised her wand up towards him, face stoic and blank and prepared for the battle he wasn't.

"What are you going to do with that?" he asked, drawing his own wand out, the brother wand, and pointing it down towards her, "Do you really think this is a fight you can win?"

"Yes," and it was, because he wasn't Voldemort yet and she'd won against that bastard. She'd survived, four times she'd faced him directly and walked away alive and whole while he just fell further and further into death and decay.

For a moment he held his wand out, itching to strike down and curse her while Harry just kept holding hers up, then, quickly, as if doing it before he could change his mind, he slammed it back into his robes with a grimace.

Harry kept her wand raised.

He just kept staring, eyes locked on her wand, then finally he looked her in the eye once again and asked, with a forced casualness, "What, exactly, do you think that I would have done in there that you had to go in and take care of it yourself?"

Harry couldn't help it, she lowered her wand and just gawked at him, mouth hanging open and asking, "Are you serious?"

"Perfectly," and his eyes flashed when he said it, like a thunderstorm was raging inside of their pale clear depths, his hands clenched and unclenched at his sides like he was just itching to draw his wand out again.

"I'm not stupid, Riddle," Harry said, feeling resolutely calm and unmovable, even when he seemed to be falling to pieces across from her, "You and I both know exactly what you would have done."

His sneer grew more pronounced, harsher, almost inhuman as he hissed, "I want to hear you say it, Evans."

"You would have turned this place into your bloody circus. You would have slaughtered the roosters, written ominous prophecies on the wall in their blood, then released the basilisk to hunt down and eat muggleborns until it finally killed someone. Then you'd go and frame the easiest victim you could find, just so that you wouldn't go to Azkaban, and Hogwarts would stay open."

And it didn't matter if he'd proved that maybe he could change, that maybe there was some spark of hope miraculously in his black soul, because this was his legacy. This, this horrible future, was the destiny that he seemed to want so badly.

That he could go from whatever he was now, good, bad, but just a student, into someone capable of killing Myrtle Warren in cold blood.

That patronus, that snake, had only been the sign she needed to know that she couldn't sit by and do nothing.

Looking him up and down, finger tapping on her wand, she concluded, "I had to go in and kill your bloody basilisk, Riddle, because you are a slavering murderous dick and a coward and nobody else was going to do it for me."

No, even in the future nobody would do it but Harry. It'd be Harry fifty years from now who… She stopped, realized that it wasn't the case anymore, twelve-year-old Harry Potter wouldn't be fighting any basilisks at all. She'd just have a normal second year like anybody else, unless the diary did something else instead but…

It wouldn't be her past anymore. She'd done it, she'd changed history, saved Myrtle and Hagrid. The basilisk was dead and she'd stopped the heir of Slytherin before he could even start. Except that meant that she could be stuck here after all, in this world that didn't want her and that she herself didn't want.

Except, could she really say that she wouldn't damn herself ten times over for Myrtle or Hagrid and everyone like them? Did they deserve what happened to them if Harry had chosen the coward's path? No, there hadn't been a moment of doubt, not then and not now.

She stepped down the next stair, mind suddenly far away from Hogwarts and everything inside of it.

"Where do you think you're going?!"

She stopped and looked back up, Tom Riddle's wand was pointed at her again, and he looked undone. More than in the chamber when she'd first seen the sixteen-year-old Tom Riddle and she'd held the basilisk fang over the diary's leather cover. He was shaking, eyes burning, and could barley point his wand straight.

She just kept looking at him, looking through him and trying to wonder what she saw there, whether it was the strange Tom Riddle she kept meeting in this timeline or the one she'd met in the chamber of secrets, finally, she said, "The chamber's still yours, you know. You can explore the bloody place all you like, have your legacy, I don't care. You just won't have your basilisk."

And with that she took a breath and stepped away from him, down every single step without looking back, even when the sound of his footsteps didn't echo hers.

When she finally entered the dorm, he didn't step in behind her.

* * *

The next day she was at classes again, her skipped classes forgiven and forgotten in pity by each and every professor, even Dumbledore writing off her detention and giving her a free pass. Slughorn insisted, even more than before, that Tom look out for her and help her along with a newfound desperation, along with an extra set of Hogwarts robes to replace the ones she'd covered in blood.

The rumor mill, of course, already whispering and concluding that after Transfiguration two days before, after Malfoy and Goyle had humiliated her with Tom Riddle in attendance, Harry Evans had attempted suicide by throwing herself out the tower window.

Lucretia, at breakfast, always the first to know anything of importance giggled in his ear, "I like how the little mudblood fails at that too, shows you how pathetic someone like that really is."

Tom didn't correct her, because he wished it was correct, he wished she had thrown herself out of a window in despair and bashed her head on the rocks below. He wished she was anything but competent and dangerous and able to make him at once ashamed, afraid, and so terribly angry.

He wished that he understood her, understood anything, that she respected him or at the very least knew nothing about him. Why couldn't she be like all the rest?! Why couldn't she be like Lucretia, Abraxas, or Orion?! Why could she look at him and see nothing, see nothing but a black pit whose every opportunity had to be slammed in his face?

Why had she taken the chamber from him before he'd even found it himself? How had she taken it from him? So easily, in the middle of the night, without anyone the wiser.

Standing on that stair case he hated her more than he'd hated anyone. More than Billy Stubbs, more than Mrs. Cole, more than even Albus Dumbledore himself because she had touched and defiled what they had never come close to. She had taken something sacred, the history of Hogwarts, more his only hint…

Tom Riddle came from a muggle orphanage, he had no father, no mother, and no surname that hinted at anything that could have come from a wizard. Oh, he'd hoped, he'd thought that perhaps his father was still alive and was a wizard or something like him and that he'd come back for Tom.

Then he'd gotten to Hogwarts and had it drilled into him that he was as genetically unextraordinary as Myrtle Warren. Nothing but the dirt beneath a Malfoy or Black's shoe.

However, years later, he'd learned that parseltongue was a rare hereditary magical ability. More, it was one that stretched back all the way to Salazar Slytherin himself, only having passed through the Slytherin line.

It had been last year in the library, and he'd sat there stunned, mouth open in awe, as he'd realized that not only was his father a wizard, but that he was the rightful heir of Slytherin. Perhaps the purest blooded human being in all of Great Britain. Yet, he'd thought as he'd stared down at the book, his name was still Tom Riddle and he was still and would always be a mudblood.

To be anything else, to transcend himself, the heir of Slytherin must only be Voldemort and that man could not exist inside Hogwarts.

Still, the chamber, over the summer, had beckoned in his head like a siren's call. On becoming prefect and the start of the year, the start of that blasted Defense project, he'd put it out of his head if only for a moment but then…

Then Harry Evans had gone and desecrated it for him without a second's hesitation.

Something that she, an unworthy mudblood who was far dirtier than Tom Riddle ever was, could never have touched in the first place.

They didn't speak all through the day or their classes, he didn't look at her and she didn't even glance at him. The project was done, only the excuse of Slughorn hanging over their heads and forcing them to work together, but that just seemed so much paler than it had a few days ago.

He watched as they whispered and stared, as she seemed hopelessly oblivious to it all, and as Alphard Black made a strange whisper of well wishes to her health even beneath the snickering of his Slytherin family members. (Poor Alphard, they said, he's always been so very odd.)

In the end, as she'd predicted, he entered the chamber alone long after curfew had passed to see the wreckage for himself. First there was nothing, just wandering down dark and narrow passageways, imagining her walking through this before him with that burning determination, and he felt…

He felt so small in her shadow, in a way he couldn't really describe except that somehow even in his own mind he was unworthy of this moment. This wasn't him entering and discovering this place after centuries, it was him in the aftermath, in Harry Evans' aftermath of something she shouldn't have even been able to touch in the first place.

How had she gotten in if she couldn't speak parseltongue? How could she have gotten in when she wasn't an heir of Slytherin?

Finally, after whispering to the door of a vault and watching as the snakes unlatched it, he walked into the central chamber, where there waiting for him was the carcass of the basilisk. He stopped at the sight of it, even yards away, and could only stare. There was nothing left of it, nothing salvageable even for parts it had been… Burned to a crisp, cooked from the inside out, and all he could think was that Harry Evans had somehow done this alone, with only her wand and her wits, and had walked back out without a scratch on her.

Looking at it he didn't even know what spell could have done that, let alone to a basilisk whose skin was all but impervious to magic. It looked small when dead, even as hulking and large as it was it looked so small in a way, and Harry's shadow only grew larger.

It took effort, far more effort than Tom would have thought existed within him, to begin walking again. The stone tiles were covered not only in algae but also in murky diluted blood, blood everywhere spreading out from the basilisk's carcass, then stray orange feathers and broken chicken bones stripped of meat (all that was left of the kidnapped roosters).

When he reached the beast's head he paused, looked down at its eyeless sockets, and he wondered what would have been. He had wondered what she thought he was, that he'd have come in here and… Except, he wondered, if it was really so outlandish. She'd sounded so very sure, and it would have been so easy, so tempting, to shake off Tom Riddle here and now and prove in this silent and secret way that he was not and had never been a mudblood.

The ultimate proof that, even though none of them would ever truly know, would vindicate him to every last one of them. Would strike fear deep into their hearts and finally force them to see him for what he…

"But what am I supposed to be?" he asked himself, almost desperately, because he had thought he was so much, biding his time until that great day, but he felt…

Adrift, ever since he'd met her, he'd been drifting or realizing that he was drifting to some destination he couldn't name. The basilisk couldn't answer him, not now, with it dead Tom was as deaf to parseltongue as everyone else.

He stumbled on, through the great gaping hole of the statue's mouth, down twisting corridors, and finally into a small well preserved library. Just as Harry had promised, it remained untouched, covered in dust from centuries ago.

The chamber was his, all except the basilisk.

He moved about, touched the walls and the books in reverence, flipped them open to reveal ancient elegant handwriting that perhaps belonged to Slytherin himself on potions, dark arts, dark creatures, and every topic in between.

Except, he kept looking up, like he expected to see Harry here or some evidence of her having been here. The idea of her being here at all gnawed at him, how she'd gotten here, why she'd really done it, how she'd gone and killed it with only a wand, if any of the blood was hers, and how she'd walked out of that as if nothing at all had happened.

And she had the gall to act like none of it mattered! Like she could just go back to being Harry Evans and no one… Well, that was the trouble, he'd been upstaged, denied his inheritance, swept aside and cast as the villain in whatever drama was inside her head, and it didn't even matter because no one else would ever no. Harry Evans would just slink quietly back into the night, disparaged for a suicide she never attempted, and she wouldn't even care.

Still, looking down at the book he wished… He couldn't help but somehow wish that she was here with him. That none of it had happened and he had found this place first, that somehow the basilisk had been avoided altogether and he'd brought her to the books, the history, instead.

No one else would ever have this, no one else would ever know, but she… She would know, somehow did know, that Tom Riddle wasn't Tom Riddle at all. If she could see the worst in him so easily, see depths of darkness that even Mrs. Cole wouldn't have guessed that h he had, then surely she should see more than that as well.

That perhaps he was capable… That he was capable of a patronus as well as murder.

He felt old, old and tired, and more alone than he ever had before. If only because before, all he'd ever had was the loneliness. His masks had also served as his blinders, he hadn't realized that there had been companionship to miss.

And he still wanted her to see him, wanted her to see more than she chose to, even after all of this.

She could have her basilisk, he could have his chamber, but he wanted more than that.

Perhaps, soon, when he came back down her he would bring her with him. They would sit together and read old manuscripts, or he would read and she'd try to fake interest.

There was a feeling of not only history in here but destiny as well, his destiny, it sang from the walls and the murky depths of ancient stagnant water. In here, he could become Voldemort.

Yet, he thought as he stood, eyes roaming every corner of the small library, somehow Harry Evans had eclipsed the chamber of secrets without anyone the wiser. Tom Riddle burned like the sun, blinded each and every one of them for his brightness and his potential, until Slughorn was prophesying that he would be the youngest minister of magic. Harry though, Harry was comprised of light on some wavelength too bright and too strong for ordinary men to see. There was only the feeling, when you looked at her, that you must be missing something or that she must be missing it.

Harry was capable of miracles, of slaying monsters, without even blinking.

When he got back to the Slytherin dormitory (a bit more of a laborious task than he'd bargained for, requiring wandering through many different passageways until he finally found the one with stairs leading up into the girl's lavatory), he found her passed out on the couch as usual. She was always doing that, always staying up into ungodly hours of the night and staring moodily into the fireplace.

Her expression would always be distant, blank, and so much more somber than she allowed herself in daylight hours. The first time he'd seen her there he'd actually paused for a moment, even when she'd been that transfer mudblood sitting next to him in Defense and had wondered what she could possibly be thinking as she stared flatly into the flames.

He rarely caught her sleeping.

Her face wasn't like others, there was no laxness, no drifting back into happier easier thoughts and times inside of her head. She kept her severe and pensive expression, wore it like armor into the world of her dreams, and prepared herself for some battle Tom could not see.

Perhaps with basilisks or perhaps with Tom himself.

It was so easy to just let her sleep, to prolong this moment, and pretend that when she woke up she'd look at him with something other than terror, wariness, or contempt. His hand reached out towards her, hovering over her shoulder, and yet he couldn't bring himself to even touch her.

He still couldn't see it, whatever it was Harry Evans really was, but he was still afraid to touch her. The basilisk, charred and dead, stretched in her shadow.

* * *

 **Author's Note: Next chapter, more drama as Harry finally figures out why everyone's being so nice/sensitive around her all of the sudden. Tom Riddle attempting and failing to get over himself while trying to maintain his shredded dignity while also trying to answer some important questions, and more.**

 **New in the "When Harry Met Tom" universe is "To Choose Glory" in which we get this version of Harry's sorting into Slytherin beneath a rather unmerciful sorting hat.**

 **Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are always much appreciated if you choose to leave one.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	8. Chapter 8

" _You take someone to the airport, it's clearly the beginning of the relationship. That's why I have never taken anyone to the airport at the beginning of a relationship."_

" _Why?"_

" _Because eventually things move on and you don't take someone to the airport and I never wanted anyone to say to me, 'How come you never take me to the airport anymore?"_

" _It's amazing. You look like a normal person, but actually you are the angel of death."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _October, 1942_

* * *

As Halloween surely but steadily approached Harry contemplated to herself that usually it was Halloween when the year at Hogwarts would take a turn for the worst. Everything would be fine and dandy and then suddenly Quirrell was releasing a troll in the dungeons, the goblet of fire was vomiting out Harry's name, a petrified Mrs. Norris was found staring at the heir's ominous message on the wall written in blood, or else that iconic Halloween of 1981 where the infant Harry had defied death and lost her family.

Halloween, then, could be said to be the official unofficial date when shit would always hit the fan.

Halloween, Harry decided, had come a few weeks early in 1942.

It'd been Thursday night by the time Harry had been hauled out of the chamber of secrets by Tom Riddle. So, with only one day left of classes she hadn't noticed too much off that Friday. Sure, there was whispering and pity retraction of detentions and lost house points from her absences. She was mostly just glad she wasn't dead in the chamber or dying in the chamber and hadn't paid too much mind to anything else. Instead, she spent the day watching and waiting for Tom Riddle to break down and do something drastic and or evil.

However, for his own part, Tom Riddle seemed to have regressed into pensive brooding. He looked at her quite often that Friday, still more than he had any right to, but more and more of that Tom Riddle show seemed to slip from him. He looked, she thought quietly to herself, tired.

More than anything else, angry, afraid, resentful, or even that usual faux charming, he looked tired. As if he'd been worn down by the world, by that brief encounter on the staircase, and could no longer find the energy necessary to put on the glorious façade of Tom Riddle.

She didn't see him all that weekend. Likely, she thought, he was moping or maniacally scheming her demise down in the chamber of secrets. Harry supposed she should be concerned about that, should maybe planning something to mitigate the damage of a Tom Riddle with too much time on his hands and a thirst for vengeance but she just couldn't bring herself to. It was weird, but there was a thought that maybe he had some right to feel the way he did.

Sure, he was evil incarnate, but Harry had technically acted before he had a chance to even do anything. Harry, having been in the situation often enough of being accused of actions she hadn't taken or thought she was never going to take could unwillingly sympathize. Sure, she had time travel and twenty-twenty hindsight on her side but that didn't mean he knew that.

Did this mean she regretted it? Not really. However, it did mean that he had some right to slink into his shadows and scheme if he wanted. Harry would handle it, she always did, and she wasn't going to go and hold it against him either.

To her own surprise, Harry realized that she'd honestly meant it when she said he could have the chamber. Just not the giant man-eating snake, thank you very much.

So, Saturday had quickly sped by with Harry's head once again buried in books she could barely read through without falling asleep, then Sunday the same, and then it was Monday and even Harry couldn't help but notice that things were… Weird.

People were staring at her. Not just Tom Riddle staring, but everyone in Hogwarts watching her every move at breakfast with a rush of whispers that would quiet down whenever she glanced in their direction. It was, in its own strange way, similar to after her name had been drawn from the goblet. Except that there wasn't the same malevolence in the air that there had been then, the sneering and distaste and turned shoulders from people she had considered her best of friends.

No, here there was that same interest, but it was accompanied by either gossiping amusement (mostly from her Slytherin peers) or else a sort of over the top concern which…

Sure, Harry had supposedly fallen out a window and she guessed she was flattered that people had noticed she was even gone, but she honestly hadn't expected this. And it just kept going too, on into Charms and then Potions and even though Harry had certainly lived through worse, it kept nagging at her. If only because the other times Harry had always known exactly what it was that was earning her the attention of the entire school.

Either it was her scar, the parseltongue fiasco, Sirius Black stalking her through the halls, the goblet of fire, or else ministry propaganda and her over the top epileptic vision fits. Every time though, Harry had known exactly what it was and would eventually be able to buck up and brush it off while carrying on like usual.

This time though all she'd done was fallen out a bloody window!

And even worse was the lack of, well, aftermath from the slaying of the basilisk. Normally, whenever Harry did something really grandiose like that, school was basically done. There'd just be the usual exams left, Gryffindor would earn some last-minute points to steal the cup from Slytherin thanks to Harry's bullshit shenanigans, Hermione would over study as usual, and then it'd be off to the Dursleys for yet another fun filled summer. Harry had never had to stick around and see what came next.

Sure, she supposed she hadn't really expected anything but some secret part of her must have as she kept looking around and waiting for the hammer to fall. Except that as Monday came and went Tom Riddle seemed more or less back to his usual self, and it was just Harry who was the sudden talk of the school. For something that wasn't the slaying of a giant secret snake in the basement.

By the time a full week had gone by since the start of this whole mess, with Harry in Transfiguration sitting next to Alphard Black and staring at the back of Tom Riddle's head again as he gossiped with Abraxas Malfoy, she just felt this odd nagging itch that she couldn't ignore any longer.

Looking down moodily at her successfully transfigured goblet, tapping her fingers impatiently, she tried to think of how she was going to get the ball rolling on this. There… Wasn't really a great way to put it, that, and she and Alphard Black were hardly friends or even acquaintances.

In fact, Harry remembered with a flush, he'd witnessed her emotional breakdown as Tom Riddle and friends had dumped surprise tutoring sessions down on her head. Which, that bastard Riddle hadn't even brought up despite the fact that tonight was Tuesday, one of his free evenings.

He'd gone through all of that, that ridiculous thing with Slughorn, and hadn't even brought it up.

A strangely timid voice interrupted her thoughts, "Are you…"

Harry blinked, looked over directly at Alphard who was looking at her with genuine concern. It was… Almost disconcerting, she thought, it'd been so long since she'd seen anyone look at her like that. She supposed that Tom Riddle pulling her out of the chamber had, but that had been, well, Tom Riddle. Naturally, he did not count when it came to that sort of thing.

Harry, blinking again, flushed harder and blurted out, "I'm sorry."

Now it was his turn to look flabbergasted. Harry wanted to curse, there she went putting her foot into her mouth as usual. There just was no helping it, at every opportunity, Harry could and would make an ass of herself.

"I'm sorry, you know last Tuesday, that you had to see…" Harry started, trailing off awkwardly and allowing her eyes to move to the safer position of inspecting Black's goblet. His, she thought somewhat bitterly, was a masterpiece compared to her own. Which was really sad given that it was Harry's second time through this assignment.

"Oh, no, don't worry about me," he said, now looking more amused than anything before that sober concern returned to his silver eyes, "I wanted to ask if you were alright. I should have gone after you, even if it meant being late for my next class and I'm so sorry that…"

"What? Oh, no," Harry interjected before sheepishly grinning back at him, "Believe me you did not want to do that."

That would probably have made it ten times more embarrassing that it already was. Well, it might have been nice to have someone to talk to that wasn't Tom Riddle, maybe reassurance at that moment that Harry wasn't totally alone in the world, but all the same…

"It's really fine. Besides, you missed me falling out of a window which I'm sure would have been very traumatic to watch," Harry said with a rather awkward laugh, but then she stopped, noticing an odd spark of emotion in Alphard's eyes, as if that was the thing he was most afraid of.

Harry, slowly, awkwardly decided to bite the bullet and just quietly go ahead and ask, "Hey, Alphard, I know we don't really know each other and that we just kind of just sit together in Transfiguration once a week but… Do you, I don't know, know why everyone's gossiping about me?"

Judging by the look on his face, that was the last thing he'd hoped that she would ask him. He glanced around awkwardly, likely searching for eavesdroppers, and Harry did the same. Most seemed engrossed in their own work, but Harry couldn't help but notice that Tom Riddle and Abraxas Malfoy's heads were turned just enough to watch Harry and Alphard out of the corner of their eyes. Malfoy with a rather Draco-esque smirk of anticipation and Tom Riddle with a thunderous frown that Harry couldn't quite parse.

Not that Harry ever really could parse Tom Riddle.

"It's, well…" Alphard said softer, barely audible amid the sound of half transfigurations. He was looking now down at the table rather than at her, as if that made this somehow easier. Finally, he said so quietly that Harry had to strain to hear it, "It's because you jumped out the window."

Harry at first blinked, about to reply that yes, she had jumped out the window but then was caught on the word. Tom had originally said fallen, fainted really, Harry had taken it up from him and said fallen out the window as well. No one, as far as Harry knew, had said she jumped.

"I didn't jump," Harry said slowly, and he looked over at her, giving her a rather piercing if sympathetic look as if he saw through her excuse…

And it finally clicked.

"Oh my god," Harry exclaimed as quietly as she could, "You all think I tried to kill myself!"

And she could see it portrayed in their collective consciousness. Harry Evans has no friends, no hobbies, and no prospects. One day after class she gets publicly humiliated by Goyle and Malfoy (they probably forgot all about bloody Riddle) and then she storms off and supposedly "falls" out of a window. By which, clearly, Harry Evans attempted to end it all by jumping off the roof of the astronomy tower.

Alphard's expression was doing nothing to contradict Harry's new, and terrible, theory.

In a dazed sort of aftermath of her epiphany Harry realized she was going to have to kill Tom Riddle. Not because he was going to become Voldemort, not because of the chamber, not even because of his many character flaws but because he had probably known they'd think this from the very start.

Tom Riddle had made everyone think that Harry couldn't handle a few spiteful comments and had had to throw herself off the roof by the second week of October.

"Look, I just fell," Harry insisted to her seat partner, hoping he at least would believe her and maybe spread the word (to whoever even cared or would bother to listen), "I know it sounds bloody ridiculous but it's really, honestly, true. I have put up with so much worse bullshit than I could ever get from him!"

Here she motioned to Malfoy and Riddle, partners in crime, for emphasis. Black's dark eyebrow raised ever so slightly but he didn't say anything one way or another. Which, Harry really wished he would because the idea that people thought she was so timid or weak that Tom Riddle calling her names in the hallway could reduce her to killing herself was like some kind of a knife in her stomach.

Harry lived in a world of constant adversity whether it was with the Dursleys, Malfoy, Hogwarts itself, or the bloody dark lord after her life. If name calling had been enough to do her in then Harry never would have made it past her bloody fifth birthday.

"You're telling me that you really just fell out of the window?" Alphard asked slowly, dubiously, which was his right as that really wasn't what happened but goddammit Harry had to tell them something!

And that something, she decided, was not going to be a suicide attempt.

"I'm saying I didn't bloody jump," Harry finally corrected with a sigh, deciding a technical truth was going to sound a lot more genuine than an outright lie. Even if the outright lie was slightly closer to reality than her going off and jumping off buildings in despair.

She paused, glanced over at Dumbledore who was now staring at them with a considering expression, as if not sure he wanted to come over and tell them it wasn't time to chit chat or else leave them be given that Harry was friendless and supposedly suicidal.

Harry wasn't sure if that was an improvement in their relationship or not.

"Well," Alphard said, interrupting her thoughts, then paused as if to consider his words. Finally he smiled at her, and it was strange because it was nothing like a smile that Sirius might give. It was too soft, there wasn't any of that marauder humor inside of it, but instead a genuine sort of sympathy that Harry hadn't realized she needed, "Either way, even though I'm not your prefect and we don't really know each other… You can talk to me. I know our lives are very different, that I might not understand, but I promise that I can listen."

"That's…" Harry trailed off, not sure what to say to that. She wasn't sure if it was the kindest thing anyone had ever said to her, or the most touching, but it was maybe the kindest thing she'd ever heard from someone who had no reason to say anything to her at all.

So, all she could do was nod, smile softly, and say, "Thanks I… I'll probably take you up on that sometime."

She grinned then, stood as the class period came to an end and gathered her books, not sure if she was ready for Divination but supposing she was ready enough. And on her way out the door, in a better mood than she'd expected to be in given that she was just told the whole bloody school believed she'd tried to kill herself, she found herself bumping into Tom Riddle.

She skidded to a halt just before she could crash into him. He looked as impeccable as always, as impeccable as Harry didn't even in new robes donated to her by the school. Prefect badge glittering, tie tied in that perfect manner that Harry had never managed to perfect in all her years of Hogwarts, not a single hair out of place. Every time he looked like this, Harry thought to herself, she came that much closer to punching him in the face.

As Harry stood there, watching as Riddle's eyes rose and his head tilted in question down at her, Alphard walked past along with all the rest on his way out the door. He glanced at her, smiled awkwardly, then with a strange sheepish sort of stoicness ignored Riddle's glare along with Malfoy's sneer and muttered insult of, "Mudblood loving tosser."

Alphard didn't say anything, didn't even look back, as he headed down the hallway and then towards the moving staircase as if he didn't have a care in the world. Soon enough, with a nod from Riddle, Malfoy was also on his way out the door, shoving Harry in the process.

Finally, once again, it was just Harry and Tom Riddle lingering just outside the doorway and the show could once again be put on hold. Harry felt herself sigh, shoved past Riddle, and made her way up the stairs towards Divination suddenly not in the mood for Tom Riddle's bullshit.

Tom Riddle, however, appeared to very much be in the mood for Tom Riddle bullshit as he walked beside her.

"So, you and Alphard Black?" Tom Riddle started, a strange sort of sneer on his face as he looked down at her, "I didn't think you had that sort of gold digging in you, Harry. I should warn you though that he's not the heir of the house of Black and is, as far as the family's concerned and do forgive the pun, something of a black sheep. I doubt he'll get much money at the end of things between his more favored siblings and cousins."

Harry flushed, wanting desperately to deny it and scream at him, except that was probably exactly what he wanted her to do. Some part of her wondered if this was it, if he'd just spent the weekend and Monday throwing her off her game so that he could get rid of her somehow here and now.

So instead, walking a little faster, Harry asked, "Don't you have Arithmancy or something?"

"We're in the same general direction," he answered, neither confirming nor denying that it was Arithmancy or some other class that supposedly brought him close enough to the Divination tower. Harry wasn't sure she believed that, but she did believe that Tom Riddle had never been late in his life and wasn't going to start now.

"Still, you didn't answer my question," he said, giving her a rather pointed look, like it was even a question that was worth her bloody time.

"What question?" Harry balked, "You said a fragment of a sentence and then called me a gold digger just because I talked to him."

"You don't talk to people, Harry," Tom Riddle corrected, "I, occasionally, talk at you."

"That's not true, I talk to plenty of people! Just, I mean, not recently but… Besides, you told everyone I tried to kill myself!" Harry blurted, glancing around at the crowds of students around them, each headed to their next class, and watching as they looked at Harry and Tom and then giggled. Jesus Christ, she thought, wasn't this what he had been trying so desperately to avoid?

Now everyone and their brother would know that Tom Riddle and Harry Evans had once walked down a hallway together.

"Oh, so that's what you two were whispering about," Tom Riddle said, nodding to himself as if suddenly everything was cleared up and fine and dandy. Then, seeing her affront he said, "Oh come on, Harry, you show up two days after being missing covered in blood. It was either that or you got raped by centaurs."

If Harry had been taking a drink she would have choked on it right then. Especially, as unwillingly, she found herself wondering what happened to Umbridge after she'd been carried away by the centaurs on sight. She gagged, flushed, then asked, "Were those really the only two options?!"

"The only two that came immediately to mind," Tom Riddle said entirely too casually with a shrug, "And no one asked you to do what you did. I certainly didn't ask it! A small amount of embarrassment and shame is the least you deserve."

The odd thing was, she thought, he didn't seem angry about that anymore. Sure, there was some lingering resentment and confusion in his expression, but not that same burning anger and betrayal from the stairs. Like he really was… over it.

In fact, maybe it was her imagination, or some show he was putting on for her benefit, but some part of him looked downright fond. Harry found herself more than a little unnerved by that spark of emotion.

"Oh yeah?" Harry asked, as she crossed her arms and walked that much faster, "Well what about your bloody shame, Riddle?! We are walking together, walking together in hallways and everyone can see you! Your reputation is ruined, Riddle, ruined!"

"No, it's not, it's Tuesday," Riddle corrected, somehow not looking concerned in the slightest even as he waved towards a flushing Minerva McGonagall (and Merlin, flushing McGonagall, flushing McGonagall looking at Tom Riddle like a teen idol) as well as all his other peers.

"What kind of an answer is…"

"You and I have tutoring sessions on Tuesdays and Thursdays on Potions, History of Magic, and how we don't kill ourselves by jumping off school buildings," he said, and he actually had the nerve to smile at her charmingly as he then stopped in his tracks, folding his hands behind his back and stating, "After dinner, seven o'clock, we meet in the common room."

"We meet in the…"

He didn't even give her a chance to finish his sentence, but instead turned on his heel, walked back down the hall and then around a corner to his own afternoon class leaving Harry standing gob smacked in his wake and right back where she started last week. Namely, even after killing his giant snake friend, still stuck in tutoring sessions with Riddle because…

Because she still had no bloody idea at all.

How was it, she wondered as she kept walking towards Divination, that she had so much clearer of an idea on how to kill a basilisk than how to handle her day to day schoolgirl 1942 drama?

* * *

You could hardly say Harry Evans looked pleased to see him after dinner but, to Tom's secret delight, she didn't look entirely displeased either. She turned towards him, eyebrows raised, and looking at him as if just by staring long enough she could discover what this latest and greatest scheme of his was.

The trouble was, he thought with some wry humor to himself, there really wasn't a scheme.

Sure, there was going to Slughorn to put this together the week before (though she had figured that out soon enough), but unlike all his other relationships there was no goal beyond that. More, there was nothing to be gained.

For as dense as she sometimes appeared, he'd discovered that Harry had something of a gift of seeing to the heart of the matter relatively quickly. In this case it was that Tom was ambitious and intent on heading places, associating himself with a muggleborn in Slytherin, particularly a muggleborn like Evans was a great way to get him nowhere fast.

Alphard Black, he thought wryly, was surely discovering that from his own relatives for all that he received enough flack merely for having been sorted into Ravenclaw.

Tom Riddle had no reason to go out of his way to acquaint himself with Harry Evans, and they both knew it. Or at least, he'd had no reason before the chamber of secrets. Now there was the lingering mystery, the hints of potential and power beyond what he'd assumed she was capable of…

However, that would mean nothing to his peers at Hogwarts and without the rather thin excuse of tutoring he'd find himself on thin ice with his housemates. Yet, here he was all the same, eager and waiting to get her alone and get started once again despite everything that had happened.

Despite the betrayal, the anger, the disappointment…

He wanted to take her back there, even after the weekend, he still wanted to even when some part of him still screamed that he should never want to see her face again.

He supposed that was the price of casting a patronus; it forced you to embrace the things you did not even know you were capable of wanting.

"So, are we doing this?" Harry asked, crossing her arms and looking even more dubious as he continued to stand there just looking at her.

As always, she managed to look windblown even after having been inside all day. Her tie was ever so slightly askew, her hair all over the place and barely contained in a rather chaotic bun, her new uniform slightly wrinkled, and her sleeves pushed up so that her pale forearms were revealed with the odd smattering of scars on her right hand that at a distance looked oddly like words.

It gave her an oddly boyish look, one that Tom couldn't help but feel he liked, even as it set her just that much further apart from her peers. Particularly her elegant and refined Slytherin housemates all descended from the wizarding aristocracy.

Tom smiled, "Yes, not here though, follow me."

Harry grumbled as she followed him, pushing the strap of her bookbag further up her shoulder, "Well, I figured that much, I'm not a bloody idiot."

They walked silently through the halls, Tom making sure to cringe and look appropriately sullen whenever they happened to pass anyone in his house while Harry just glared at him a little harder each time this happened, until Harry realized they weren't headed to the staircase but instead the Dungeon bathroom.

"Oh," Harry said, catching on rather quickly all things considered, and Tom noted as she reached inside for her wand, "Oh there's no way in bloody hell…"

"Now, Harry, I'll have you know that Slytherin has quite the collection of ancient texts that one cannot find in the library or I suspect anywhere else in the world."

When Harry opened her mouth to interject Tom continued, "Even, I suspect, books on the nature of time and time travel."

That shut her up. Her mouth closed, her glare at first became confrontational and then distant as he didn't press the matter. He could almost see her cursing herself as she fought between turning around and walking back to where she came from no matter the consequences or else following him down below for a hint of these books.

Books that she'd been so obsessed with that he'd seen her reading nothing else since she got here.

"I'm going to kill you one of these days," Harry said, but it lacked any real venom and was instead said as a means of conceding defeat. Tom smiled back at her, all good-natured charm that he knew she didn't believe for a second.

On reaching the door he paused, held up a hand to stall her, and listened for the tell-tale wailing of Myrtle Warren.

"What are you…" Tom hushed her before she could finish, listening instead for the sniffling that came in between the bouts of wailing. It appeared, for once, they were a bit too early for Myrtle's nearly nightly ritual of sobbing to herself.

He motioned Harry in behind him walked towards the sinks, found the gate to the chamber of secrets, and then with a look of awe commanded it, " _Open_ "

They watched as the basin moved apart and revealed the dark entrance to the chamber, Harry looking down at it with a leery and rather unimpressed look, "You know, Riddle, this is the sort of thing that you only want to have to jump into once in your life."

"Oh come on, Harry, where's your sense of adventure?" Tom asked, reaching out for her hand. Harry didn't offer hers, but instead glared at him rather mulishly, hand still reaching into her robes to finger her wand.

"Harry," he prompted, still holding out his hand in invitation.

"See, here's the thing," Harry started, then stopped, glared at him again and said, "First, we are not on a first name basis. We will never be on a first name basis, so it's Evans, alright? Second, why do I have the feeling the moment I jump down there you're just going to stick a knife in my guts, leave me to bleed out, and then tell everyone in Hogwarts that I just managed to kill myself more permanently this time."

"First, Harry, I wouldn't do that because blood is messy and I can't say I'm much of a fan of cleaning it out of my robes," he said, glancing down at his immaculate outfit and considering that he'd never cleaned blood out of robes period, "Obviously, I'd just use the killing curse."

"Obviously," Harry repeated drily, although with an odd twist of humor as if there was something very ironic about Tom Riddle saying that which she quietly found beyond hysterical.

"Second, is it that hard to believe that I honestly have no intention of killing you?"

"I killed your snake," Harry pointed out, almost reflexively, which made it seem that she had a very difficult time believing he didn't want to kill her which…

On the one hand, it was almost funny and perhaps flattering that she was willing to take him so seriously, but on the other hand it caused that small part of him that seemed to want her good opinion to twist just a little.

"All the same, Harry, I… I have no desire to kill you. Truly," he said, and it was amazing that he truly did mean that, more than he ever had before. He had wanted to kill Dumbledore, had wanted to murder Mrs. Cole, had wanted to kill even those that had barely even offended him at all. Once, he'd wanted nothing more than Evans to just be another corpse at his feet but… But she would never be that, even if she was dead, instead she'd be this empty shell of all that she once was. A thing of wasted potential.

And even if he tried he suspected he couldn't bring himself to want that anymore.

"I don't believe you," Harry said, now fully drawing out her wand and settling into an easy duelist's stance.

"Oh, for Christ's sake, what would it take to convince you?" he asked, throwing his hands into the air and wondering how it had come down to this. No one else would do this to him, no one else would even think to do it! He could take Lucretia Black into an unlabeled street in Knockturn Alley and she wouldn't even blink!

Harry considered this, wand still pointed straight at his chest, and then said, "Unbreakable vow."

"An unbreakable vow?!"

"Yup," she said, not wavering in the slightest, not even seeming to recognize how insulting that was.

"What, that I will never attempt to murder you either directly or by proxy?!"

Here she paused, considered him with more than a little conflict in her eyes, and said, "I… I'm not actually sure I can make you promise that without doing… really really bad things. How about… just until 1981?"

(Sometimes, he thought to himself, he couldn't really believe that Harry Evans was supposed to be a normal schoolgirl and not some kind of an alien.)

He felt his jaw drop ever so slightly, and motioned towards her, "What, is that when your number comes up? What happens in 1981 that all bets are off? Why not just make that 1943 or 1945 when we graduate?"

"I don't know, 1981 seems like a pretty good year," Harry said, rather awkwardly at that, clearly hiding the true reason behind this lame casual excuse, "You'll be old, I'll be old, it'll give our duel to the death a real… Oh, I don't know, something to it?"

Tom wasn't even sure he wanted to know. Still, he considered her proposal. On the one hand while he certainly had no intention of murdering Harry Evans right now that didn't mean he wouldn't be sorely tempted to later. Even the idea of binding him to an unbreakable vow was not simply insulting but grating to his entire being. Anyone else would be marked for death for even daring to suggest it.

Except, goddamn her, this was… If he did this then he was that much closer. To what, exactly, he wasn't sure except that this was the leap of faith she was looking for. If he had made this earlier, had offered this bargain earlier, then perhaps she would not have gone for the basilisk.

He would be one step closer to the heart of whatever Harry Evans truly was and he hated that he wanted that enough to consider it.

Closing his eyes, cringing, he held out his hand.

"Hand please," he commanded, hearing as Harry gasped, cursed in shock, and then slapped her hand into his. It was thin, more calloused than he had expected, and very warm.

For a moment he simply held it, allowed himself to feel the tingle of her magic beneath his fingertips. Then, with a breath, he took the plunge, "I, Tom Marvolo Riddle, do hereby vow not to attempt to murder Harry Evans either directly or by proxy until January 1st, 1981."

Opening his eyes there was a great, almost blinding glow, and then nothing but the leftover reverberations of magic and Harry staring down at their joined hands in shock as well as in awe.

Grimacing at her, he said, "Don't make me regret that."

With that, and without a second glance, he took his hand from hers and jumped down into the pit waiting until she followed and landed gracelessly next to him.

"I can't believe you did that," She said as she stumbled to her feet, looking almost dazed as he led her into the chamber, closing the entrance behind him as he went.

"I can't believe you…" she repeated, or attempted to, until he interjected.

"Neither can I," he said, "I hope you know that I wouldn't do that for anyone."

"I know but…" Harry trailed off, rubbed at her head, "I'm really confused."

"It'll pass," Tom said blandly, "Try not to think too much, you'll give yourself a headache."

"But…" she threw her hands in the air as if she had given up any attempt to figure this out, "I just don't understand you, Riddle!"

"Tom, please, we're on a first name basis now," Tom corrected her, smirking at her rather indignant look in response as she maneuvered her way around the shed basilisk skin as well as the uneven floor with surprising dexterity.

"I said we're not on a first name basis!"

"I just offered you an unbreakable vow, if that's not worth a first name here and there I don't know what is."

Harry did not seem suitably impressed by Tom's magnanimous act, "A vow not to murder me, one with an expiration date!"

"An expiration date that you so graciously provided to me," Tom responded, "Which, thank you. In the event that I do wish to gut you I will eagerly await 1981 with anticipation as well as gratitude for your thoughtfulness."

"I'll bet you will," Harry scoffed, frowning and looking away from him, again unintentionally looking rather adorable versus anything truly intimidating.

Nothing, he thought to himself, that looked like someone who could find the chamber of secrets and then take down a basilisk with nothing but a wand and her own bare hands.

"Speaking of, it's been nagging at me all week, but how did you manage to get down here the first time?" Tom asked, now looking around them, "I've been searching this place all weekend looking for ways in and out, and as far as I can tell there's no exit or entrance that doesn't require one to be a parselmouth."

He really had at that, spent the whole bloody weekend either reading through Slytherin's extensive personal library or searching for the way that Evans must have taken to get into the place. At first, he'd assumed the girl's bathroom main entrance he'd taken, but that one had required parseltongue. Besides, she might have merely known it was the most obvious entrance for Tom or any other rescuer to find and left her note there accordingly before seeking out some other way in. Except that the few other more obscure entrances and exits (the ones having stairs) had required it as well or else had only served as a sort of emergency exit.

As it was, the mystery of how Harry Evans had even gotten down here in the first place was still hopelessly unsolved.

She stopped dead in her tracks, looked at him with wide green eyes, and then abruptly started walking again, "I got lucky, I guess."

"Right," Tom said slowly, deciding not to push for the moment however much he wanted to, he'd get the answer eventually, he always did. Instead he asked, "And you knew I was a parseltongue when no one else besides Professor Dumbledore does because?"

This time she didn't stop, didn't stumble either, but seemed to keep walking with a kind of desperation as if speed alone would stop his inquiries. Still, she eventually responded, "I guess I figured that if anyone could get me out of there or figure it out that it'd be you."

For a moment he just looked at her, oddly… touched by what she said. She didn't mean it, would never have said it if she wasn't trying to throw him off the tracks, except somehow it warmed his heart all the same. This idea that Harry knew and accepted that out of anyone in this school, Tom was the one she could rely on in an impossible situation like that.

He tried to shake the feeling off, "Well, I'd say I was flattered if I believed you."

"And that's not my problem," Harry responded, as if it was, indeed, anything but her problem.

"Well, see, I think it is your problem," Tom said slowly, smiling when she glared at him again as he whispered towards the vault to gain them entrance to the central area of the chamber, "Because I'm afraid you've caught my interest, Harry Evans, and you'll find that that is a truly rare thing."

"And?" she asked as she followed him in, warily eyeing the charred body of the basilisk, now cleared of the blood and feathers left behind from her battle with the creature. That he'd have to attend to later, see if there was anything salvageable from the thing that could be sold on the black market. As it was the parts that would have gotten him the most money, the eyes, the skin, were beyond all repair.

"And," Tom continued for her with a smile that he couldn't contain even if he'd wanted to, "You'll find I'm rather tenacious and that when you've caught my interest, given me a mystery whose solution I honestly cannot guess, I can't imagine I'll ever let go."

Predictably, she blanched grew paler even as he laughed in delight and held out his arm so that she could hook hers in his. She walked past him, much to his lack of surprise, but he hardly let that dampen his spirit as he sidled alongside her.

And, as they walked past the charred, eyeless, corpse of the basilisk and towards Slytherin's library, he couldn't help but note, "You know, Harry, if you'd left well enough alone and simply let me pick whatever blasted Defense project we'd have to work on I sincerely doubt we'd be having this conversation."

Now, he wasn't entirely sure this was true, some part of him thought that he and Harry Evans could never truly pass one another by even in some other life. Even if Tom had desperately tried, as he undoubtedly would have desperately tried. Something, somehow, he thought would have drawn his attention to her. Still, all the same, he enjoyed the widening of her eyes, the slackening of her features in horror, and then her curse echoing through the chamber, "Goddammit!"

And even if she'd never believe him, or if she'd deny it until the day she died while she made eyes at Alphard Black, he truly believed that they were on their way to becoming the best of friends.

* * *

 **Author's Note: Oh Harry, so noble in attempt to sort of kind of preserve the timeline. Mostly an aftermath chapter of an aftermath chapter to prepare us slowly but surely for the next major events but it's all in good fun.**

 **Thanks for reading and reviewing, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	9. Chapter 9

" _Yes it is. You are a human affront to all women and I am a woman."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _October 1942_

* * *

Harry, as it turned out, had watched much more television before going to Hogwarts than Hermione had.

Hermione hated the tele, had been too enamored of her books to look up at a pixelated screen, not to mention she'd been rather dismissive of movies and television as a whole. She'd told Harry, in the beginnings of their friendship, that she found it dull and mind numbing and clearly anyone of real intelligence would sit down and read a book.

Harry didn't point out that the Dursleys hadn't encouraged the reading of books, not to mention Dudley had torn to shreds the few books she'd dared to take home from the school's library and she hadn't tried since.

Hermione wouldn't understand, especially back then, her world was so small.

To her it was taken for granted that her parents loved her, supported her interests and hobbies, and provided her with whatever it was she needed. Hermione had the luxury of being able to choose books over television, the only reason Harry even had television was because all Dudley did was watch the tele.

Rarely could she catch a full show or movie, could rarely give it her full attention as she'd have to clean the living room or vacuum while it was on and blaring, but she generally caught enough bits and pieces of everything he saw to get the full idea.

Dudley watched pitifully stupid shows most of the time, not that this was surprising, Dudley was pitiably stupid after all.

Now here, in 1942 inside the chamber of secrets, her mind was cast back to the television and the bits and pieces of the many shows she had watched on it. Tracing the word sidhe, written in Slytherin's elegant handwriting, she found herself thinking of the strange movie Dudley had once watched that he never was supposed to have touched.

He had been nine, feeling very rebellious too, because he knew as well as she did that even Dudley wouldn't be spared the wrath of Uncle Vernon when it came to magic. He hadn't either, even when he'd tried to pin it on her, both of them had seen the belt that day.

Still, all the same she remembered it, "Labyrinth" featuring David Bowie as the goblin king in very tight tights and more glitter than Harry had thought could possibly stick to a human face. More importantly, of the bits and pieces she'd caught, his ability to manipulate time and space itself…

"Harry, can you not even pretend to pay attention?"

Harry looked up, caught Tom looking at her with a rather put out expression once again and tried not to flush with embarrassment. God, she was becoming too used to this.

It was Thursday, again, and true to his word like every other Tuesday and Thursday Harry was escorted down to the Chamber of Secrets where he'd quiz her on History of Magic and Potions to his heart's content. Well, until they both got tired of it and he let Harry continue looking through Slytherin's books as he'd promised, for some hint of an answer that probably wasn't in the Hogwarts library.

There hadn't been so far, not really, and eventually she'd moved on from his research to notes on his travels before having met up with the founders.

"Harry," Tom repeated, as if he had any right to her name, now sighing as if she really was such a trial and he had no idea why he'd forced himself into this mess.

"What?"

"You know it reflects on me when you do poorly," Tom reminded her, for what had to be the fifteenth time in the past few weeks. Or perhaps he'd been reminding himself, it was after all his feeble excuse for doing all of this.

"I'm sorry, Riddle, for continuing to stain your reputation," Harry hissed back, wanting to look back down at Slytherin's journal to catch that hint of an idea she'd been having. God, it'd been on the tip of her tongue, somewhere in that memory, she was sure of it.

Tom said nothing, simply looked at her again, that frank, unnerving, assessing, and sometimes oddly fond gaze that he only seemed to give her in these tutoring sessions. Like he knew he was trash but was slowly coming to terms with the fact that he kind of liked trash.

Harry just wanted to punch him in the face.

"What?" Harry finally asked, looking up from her book again to find him giving her an oddly soft smile. It wasn't the kind of smile that even Ron or Hermione had given her, it was an understanding and sympathetic thing, impossibly fond in ways Harry couldn't even describe.

And the fact that he was giving it to her was sending shivers up her spine.

"You're not stupid," he remarked, and it was so casual, as if they were talking about the weather.

"What?" Harry asked again, the flush now unstoppable on her cheeks and god how had she even gotten into this mess? Well, there'd been Slughorn, then the chamber, and then it just seemed to have all built on itself and they were down here away from prying eyes twice a week.

Twice a week down in this dark, dank, library with Tom Riddle, trying not to think about anything or how long this could possibly go on for. Because it had to end and go back to normal, didn't it? He'd get tired or realize how stupid this was and it'd be over, and Harry would be blessedly invisible once again. It had to, that was just how things worked, the way things were as Tom Riddle himself had said.

Except she still couldn't figure out why he was doing this, she wasn't nice to him, and he didn't seem to want anything specifically from her except for her time and company. She just… he had to want something, he always wanted something, but whatever it was she had no idea what it could possibly be.

"You're not stupid," he repeated before giving her a rather knowing look, "I think you're simply lazy."

"Lazy," Harry repeated dully and now more than a little insulted, "I'm not lazy."

Aunt Petunia had called her lazy, sure, but Harry had never actually been lazy. All she did was bloody try until her fingers were raw and bleeding. Try at the things no one else even bothered to look at or solve and it all fell on her shoulders and…

Tom lifted her Potions textbook, waving it in front of her face as if it was particularly damning evidence, "Perhaps you wouldn't be the best, you don't seem to have any innate talent for the subject, but you could be leagues better than you are now if you only tried."

"Maybe I just hate Potions," Harry spat back, much to Tom Riddle's lack of amusement. Because god, hadn't she always hated Potions? From the first second she'd been in that class and Snape's eyes had honed in on her?

"You think I enjoy all of my subjects?" Tom asked, which Harry had kind of assumed he did as Hermione always had and Tom was something like an evil male version of Hermione, "It's not about enjoyment, Harry, it's about what you have to do. Honestly, what do you think you will do when you leave this place?"

"Hogwarts, you mean?" Harry asked, then flushing and trying not to think of Slytherin's journal under her hands or her desperate quest to return to the future, admitted, "I honestly haven't thought that far ahead."

If she didn't make it back she just would… Keep going, somehow, someway, she'd keep moving forward always searching for a way back. She wasn't here to build a life, a future, for herself.

"Well you'd better, graduation is just around the corner," Tom Riddle said, with a sort of mocking amusement, as if he had thought about nothing but graduation since he'd started Hogwarts, "And with your pedigree and your lack of feminine charm your only hope of not living in a box in the gutter is doing exceptionally well in your classes."

Harry finally had enough, threw her hands into the air, and asked, "Why do you care?!"

It had been bothering her for weeks, no maybe since near the beginning of October, when he'd suddenly flipped everything on its head and started paying any real kind of attention to her.

"So, I'm going to be homeless and broke," Harry stood, pacing back and forth and throwing her hands in the air, "So marriage isn't even a way out, not that I'd settle for that anyway, but why do you care?!"

"I don't—"

"Clearly, you do, because you keep bringing it up. You keep doing this!"

"This?" Tom asked, as if he had no idea at all what she was talking about.

"Yes," Harry said, motioning to their surroundings, to her being in the same room as him, "This!"

"Don't you have plans for yourself?" Harry asked, the words just tumbling out of her mouth like flood water out of a breaking dam, "Don't you have some delusions of grandeur to chase after? Don't I get, oh I don't know, even a little in the way of those?! Why are you here, Riddle? And don't tell me Slughorn because you and I both know that you could weasel out of that the same way you weaseled into this predicament in the first place!"

He sat in silence for a moment, watching her dully as she breathed heavily, waiting for him to do something normal, sensible, or just plain evil for once. He didn't though, and eventually she forced herself to sit back down, to open her book and think of a way out of 1942 and hope that even though she'd broken everything she hadn't really broken everything.

There had to be a way back, some road she hadn't considered, even when she had clearly altered the timeline there just had to…

"They're not delusions of grandeur."

"What?" Harry asked, looking up at him, but for once he wasn't looking at her, was instead looking past her towards the bookshelves.

"I fully intend to see them become reality, so they're not delusions."

"Oh, great," Harry responded, trying not to bitterly respond that she'd seen it in action, this future of his that he wanted so badly. To rule other men with an iron fist and destroy everything around him…

"And you're not mutually exclusive, Harry."

Harry rubbed her eyes, couldn't believe she was asking again as the word slipped out of her, "What?"

He gave her a small, bitter smile, "Do you know what Tom Riddle is, Harry?"

"… Is that a trick question?"

"He's a mudblood," Tom answered for her as if this was the most obvious answer in the world, "He's an impoverished, orphan mudblood who has no hope for his future other than what he carves out for himself. After Hogwarts, Tom Riddle will disappear back into the ether, a dull memory of someone with so much potential had the stars been better aligned."

Harry was now officially lost, "What's that even supposed to mean?"

For a moment he didn't answer, as if the answer should be obvious and Harry just wasn't getting it, which… She wasn't, at all, but then leaning back in his chair he asked, "Have you ever heard of the slug club, Harry?"

Were they even having a coherent conversation anymore? And was a slug club exactly what it sounded like? She had the terrible feeling that it was, maybe she was dreaming, or dead, or still in hell…

"The what?"

"Professor Slughorn hosts a monthly dinner for those students he sees as… going places. Me, all our favorite heirs to the noble and ancient houses, several quidditch captains. Naturally, you haven't been invited."

Harry snorted, and god did she hate that Tom Riddle was rather witty and she could laugh at his weird jokes. She preferred the universe where he hissed death threats at her with a snake's face.

"One usually, for Halloween and Christmas especially, is expected to bring a plus one," he gave her a rather significant look then, and Harry had a terrible feeling this was going where she suddenly thought it was going.

"No," Harry said before he could even ask.

"No?" he responded, actually having the nerve to look insulted.

"No," Harry repeated, because even if she was in this weird reality of Tom Riddle having just maybe asked her on a date, she just wasn't going to go there, "There is no chance in hell, even if hell were to freeze over, the answer is no."

"Really?" he asked, "Are you busy?"

"As a matter of fact yes," Harry said, "I've already got these bloody tutoring sessions with you, plus, Halloween is reserved for me being nowhere near anything that can go terribly wrong. And a club of slugs sounds like it can go terribly wrong."

"Go terribly wrong?" he asked, sounding like she was the one who had lost her marbles.

"Something always goes terribly wrong on Halloween," Harry said, crossing her arms and refusing to explain further, "It's bloody cursed."

"Cursed," he repeated dully, like he really couldn't believe her, which was fine because she wasn't going anyway. He could take anyone in the world he wanted, they'd probably eagerly say yes, they just wouldn't be Harry Potter.

"Do you know anything about fairies?" she blurted, willing the conversation to move somewhere else, shoving Salazar's journal towards him.

"The fair folk?" he asked, taking the book from her, pursing his lips at the brief description of Salazar's travels in Ireland, "No, I can't say I know much."

"But they have great power, like house elves I mean, more than wizards and witches," Harry insisted, because it really was coming together now. Dobby had been incredibly powerful, and she wasn't really sure why house elves were enslaved to wizards, but none the less he could do loads of things wizards and witches couldn't. If the fair folk could do things like that, then maybe they could do what no wizard or witch could possibly do, maybe they could touch time directly in a way that Harry couldn't.

Maybe Harry had been looking in all the wrong places.

"I suppose," he said musingly before looking up at her with a small and almost mischievous smile, "But what does this have to do with the slug club?"

"I will hit you," Harry said, but she was already packing her things, her mind across the sea and to Ireland. Yes, she'd go during the holiday break, to where Salazar Slytherin had been centuries before to run across them.

She'd somehow get them to meet with her, do some reading on what to prepare for (because she vaguely remembered that fairies could be… not nice) and seek them out and maybe they'd make a way for her to get home.

It'd be the first time she wouldn't be spending Christmas at Hogwarts…

Well, it was for the best anyway, Tom Riddle would undoubtedly be stuck here as well and god forbid she was alone with him for that long without classes interrupting.

"Where are you going?"

"We're done here, aren't we?" Harry asked, honestly, where did he think she was going.

"You need me to get out of here," Tom spat back, but he was gathering his things to, "And I expect you to do better in Potions tomorrow or Slughorn will have my head!"

"Yeah, sure, great," Harry said hardly paying attention, because she could feel hope bubbling inside her, that she'd be home before winter was over and it didn't matter if Tom Riddle dragged her to the basement trying to be funny and charming and invite her to slug clubs.

She'd be free and back and facing all the consequences of her own, true, life just like she should be.

* * *

The slug club…

He didn't know why he had invited her. It'd just slipped out of his mouth as he'd looked at her, her enraged confusion as she asked him why he was doing this. It'd felt, somehow, like the most natural thing in the world to ask.

He hated the slug club, he loathed it with a passion he could barely contain. Every month hours of his time was spent laughing, smiling, and drinking away with people he wished that he could wipe from the face of the earth.

Maybe that was why, for that single moment down there in the chamber where the world melted away, he'd thought she should come with him.

Of course, as she herself had pointed out, it was a stupid thing to do.

He couldn't afford any true association with Harry Evans, not if he didn't want to be living in a box in the gutter either, and he was risking enough as it was with even this but…

It would be so much easier if she was there.

She was becoming a bloody addiction, each week he'd count down the seconds towards Tuesday and Thursday, find his eye drifting towards her in class as she slumped in her seat and doodled in her notebooks.

Perhaps it wasn't her so much as it was the freedom she represented, that freedom that he'd given up on except in the distant future of Voldemort, except God he wanted it now! He wanted to do as he wanted, say what he liked, right now and it was hard when the opportunity lied with her to resist it.

And he really was no one.

True, he was Slytherin's heir but… But Tom Riddle couldn't be Slytherin's heir, not if Voldemort was to take that mantle later, no one could know. So he had to remain a mudblood, had to confine himself to wanting and gaining nothing, for maybe earning some pitiable job in the ministry.

Tom Riddle would disappear, Voldemort would replace him, and by that logic why couldn't Tom Riddle do what he pleased? His days were numbered anyway, in the long run no one would remember him, so why shouldn't he do what he wanted with the little time he had left?

It was like death, of a kind, wasn't it? He'd always been eager for it before, but in the weeks since the chamber he'd found himself thinking more and more that a kind of an end was approaching. He was… mourning Tom Riddle, in a way, poor and hopeless as he was he'd miss Hogwarts and all he'd made of himself in these walls.

And Tom Riddle had Harry, or, at least… He had the potential of having Harry. Voldemort would not.

He was getting increasingly sentimental, he scoffed to himself, besides it wasn't as if she was going anywhere either. She'd still be here, even when he left Tom Riddle behind he could find her again, shape her into something that wasn't a mudblood but instead a woman capable of slaying basilisks without anyone the wiser.

He had been patient before, he could be patient again and…

"Merlin, Riddle, I didn't see you there," Abraxas said, stumbling and brushing off his robes as he looked Tom in the eye.

"Ah, Evans again?" Abraxas asked, taking in Tom's appearance and general air of malcontent, "You've got to get Slughorn to get rid of these tutoring sessions for you."

Tom forced himself to smile pleasantly, and didn't that just get harder every day, as Abraxas joined him to walk towards the common room, "Yes, well, it has only been a few weeks."

"A whole year of tutoring isn't going to improve that one," Abraxas scoffed, "Honestly, if I didn't know better, I'd say you were enjoying the mudblood tart's company."

A tart, Malfoy almost always called her something to that effect as often as he called her a mudblood, except she wasn't a tart. Boyish and masculine, certainly, but not worthy of any sort of derogatory phrase either.

However, it was that last part that had Tom stopping in his tracks to look at Malfoy, "What did you say?"

Malfoy paled, remembering perhaps bits and pieces of their early Hogwarts career when they'd learned exactly why you didn't fuck with Tom Riddle. His smile was nervous, on edge, as he said, "Come on, Riddle, you have Slughorn wrapped around your finger. I'm sure if you whined enough you could push her off onto someone else."

"Would you rather it be you?" Tom asked, hand instinctively slipping to finger his wand.

"Don't even bloody joke!" Malfoy spat, before shaking his head, "He could get a Hufflepuff, or hell, what about mudblood loving Black? I'm sure good old Alfie would be dying to get a little alone time with the tart if you know what I mean."

Alphard Black, second in their class to Tom, and friendly enough with Harry Evans in the weeks since her disappearance. They met in the halls now as well as class, sometimes Harry would have lunch with him or meet him in the library when Tom Riddle wouldn't dare to be seen with him. Black who had so much to lose and yet was willing to throw it all away on the mudblood girl in a way Tom couldn't bring himself to dare to.

"Yes, pin it on Alfie," Malfoy said, inordinately pleased with himself, "Oh, no, wait until the slug club, I want to hear him try to pretend he has some dignity in front of Slughorn."

Tom started walking again, a kind of numbness descending on him, and he heard himself dully respond, "Yes."

"Can you imagine?" Malfoy asked, "I bet you anything he blushes like a schoolgirl, he's probably been hoping for weeks."

"I'm sure," Tom parroted in agreement, but all he could see was her face, her eyes. Her grin, her laughter, her frown, all of it distant and out of his reach. All of this planning with Slughorn come to nothing because Alphard Black truly was the perfect candidate.

The pair would meet in the library without shame, Tom's esteem with the Slytherin's would grow even higher for having shamed Alphard Black and put him in his place, and Harry Evans would disappear back into her own isolated bubble.

He would graduate Hogwarts, perhaps become Defense professor if he played his cards right and the stars aligned, and he would all too likely never see her again. And the Tom who existed without masks, the true Tom underneath it all, would disappear into Voldemort's shadow as if he too had never existed in the first place.

"Should I invite her as well?" he asked, his words still odd and distant even to his own ears, "So she has a front row seat."

"Oh, bloody hell," Abraxas said, clearly torn between his amusement and the sheer distaste of having to share the night with Harry Evans, "Oh, it's so hard to say no to that. I bet you anything she wears a suit like a man too…"

"I'll take that as a yes then," Tom said, as if he would have taken no for an answer, as if he could when it felt like the walls themselves were closing around him.

She'd barely looked at him when they'd left tonight, caught in her own head with the fairies and house elves, completely indifferent to the fact that she had so easily and cruelly rejected him when he had never asked anyone else in the world.

"Well, sure, but don't expect me to go and protect your reputation, Riddle," Malfoy said, back to his typical holier than thou attitude that he had always taken with Tom, "This is on your head."

"Won't her humiliation be evidence enough of my motives?" Tom asked, and Malfoy laughed, had the nerve to laugh at that, because a few years ago that would have unquestionably been evidence enough.

Apparently still was evidence enough though it felt too malicious without any reason.

Tom had been malicious often, he would admit it, but he had always been cruel with purpose. The only thing was that no one, perhaps not even Harry Evans, seemed to be able to tell the difference.

All the dates and conversations in the world with mudbloods could be forgiven if he made sure to slander her at the right moment.

And he felt like Tom Riddle was already dying, already sentenced to an execution date at the end of his seventh year, and that with the end of Hogwarts he would not be free but instead would be in free fall with only the dream of Voldemort waiting for him at the bottom.

* * *

 **Author's Note: Hello, it's been a while, hasn't it? There's a new fic in the universe "A Code of Honor" in which Tom and Harry bicker. Because what is a world without Tom and Harry bickering.**

 **Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	10. Chapter 10

" _The fact that you're not answering leads me to believe you're either (a) not at home, (b) home but don't want to talk to me, or (c) home, desperately want to talk to me, but trapped under something heavy. If it's either (a) or (c), please call me back."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _October 1942_

* * *

"Ah, Halloween, my nemesis, we meet again," Harry muttered to herself as she entered the great hall, not really caring about the snickering of her Slytherin housemates or their side-eyeing of crazy mudblood Evans. Halloween, Harry had discovered in her tumultuous youth, was not a date for preserving one's reputation.

No, it was the single consistently worse date of her life starting with when she was only a year old and just topping itself every year since. The Dursleys had always been particularly… Dursleyish every time Halloween rolled around. The taboo of all things fantastical heightened to an absurd degree that didn't even spare Dudders, which he of course took out on her as he never got any candy at all during the date, which meant Harry would spend the next week with a black eye repeating dully to her teachers, "I tripped down the stairs"

She'd thought, naively, when she was a sweet and adorable eleven-year-old being whisked away like Cinderella to that ball called Hogwarts, that it'd get better there just like everything else had. Quirrell of course ruined that with "Troll in the dungeons!"

Then Tom Riddle version 2.0: the love diary had topped that with "The chamber of secrets is open! Enemies of the heir beware!"

Then… Was that the date Sirius had broken into the Gryffindor tower and cut up Ron's pillow like an '80's slasher villain, or was that some other date? Harry couldn't quite remember but she was willing to say it was bloody Halloween just for consistency.

Certainly, the Goblet of Fire had been Halloween! And how had she known? How had she known even before it started spitting out names? Harry, she'd said to herself, I bet you ten-thousand galleons that it's going to vomit "Harry Potter" out in noxious blue flames. Then what does it do? It vomits out Harry Potter and she spends the next year almost getting burnt alive by dragons, drowning, fighting evil hedges, and then of course the end with…

Well, yes.

The point was, Harry had learned her lesson. She may not have learned it by 1996 but she damn well recognized it in 1942! She had made it through classes, made it through Herbology and Charms, and now all that was left was to rescue some treacle tart from the table and then hole up somewhere and wait for Halloween to pass her over.

Especially, she thought as her eyes drifted to where Tom Riddle was charmingly laughing with Lucretia Black and other cronies, since Harry could practically feel the voodoo forces of Halloween conspiring against her.

And by voodoo forces she meant Tom Riddle asking her every chance he got (every second someone else wasn't looking) to the slug club.

Which, really, what was he doing?

Honestly, the more time she spent with the bloke the less she bloody understood him.

Unless, of course, that was his plan all along. Harry was almost paranoid enough to believe that he somehow knew or had some sort of inkling about Harry's mysterious future-past and was now doing his darndest to throw her off the scent. Except really poorly, as he'd made less and less excuses for his behavior and attitudes and seemed to almost revel in not putting on a show.

Which, Harry supposed that could be it? She had thought it would get exhausting to be Tom Riddle all the time. She supposed even Tom Riddle could get tired of Tom Riddle. Still…

Why was she thinking about him?

Harry had a mission, dammit!

"Right, treacle tart," Harry reminded herself, reaching across for a plate and several slices, ignoring the disdainful look of what was probably Millicient Bulstrode's great aunt. It really was amazing how much of her old Hogwarts classmates she saw lurking inside their ancestors.

Harry just inclined her head in a polite nod of recognition towards her housemates, "Ladies, enjoy the feast."

Titters, laughter, some smug noting that lowly Harry Evans was so lowly she couldn't even stay for the Halloween feast, and Harry was on her way to sweet solitude.

"Evans."

And Harry stopped in her tracks.

There, now standing from his seat in what looked like utter exasperation, was Tom Riddle in full prefect and unwilling tutor mode dealing with chronic menace and ultimate problem child Harry Evans.

"Evans," Riddle repeated, this time with a truly dramatic sigh, "Don't tell me you're planning on skipping dinner entirely."

"Yes?" Harry said, though it came out somehow more as a question then a statement, because what was his problem with this? This was Christmas for him and Slytherin, Harry Evans walking away in shame and defeat for all the school to see.

Wait a minute…

"Bloody hell," Harry said as Riddle's expression became that much sourer and exasperated. More importantly though, as she glanced at the staff table, Slughorn was looking at Tom in clear expectation as well as disapproval.

Tom Riddle, Slytherin prefect, had been expected to improve Harry Evans' dismal social life to prevent her from doing things like jumping out of windows. If Harry snuck off during one of the largest feasts of the year to eat by herself in some forgotten corner of Hogwarts then Tom Riddle wasn't doing his job. And if Tom Riddle wasn't doing his job then he wasn't doing his job and Harry was going to have to pay the price.

"Look, Riddle," Harry started even as she started biting into her desert, really wanting to just get on with it and sneak off somewhere like the room of requirement for a few hours, "I don't see why it's your problem that I don't want to stay here for the feast. People skip dinner all the time, I skip dinner all the time, it's not that big of a deal and I just don't have the energy to go through with it today."

Halloween, after all, while ironically the date she'd had to deal with Voldemort the most, was probably the date she was least able to handle him.

"Oh, believe us, Evans, we're not exactly thrilled—" Malfoy senior started muttering under his breath but was cut off by a particularly scathing look from Riddle. Which, Harry supposed it was good to know that even with the face of an angel Tom Riddle could look bloody terrifying when he chose to.

"Do you think you're better than us, Evans?" Riddle asked point blank, folding his hands together like he had all the time in the world and Harry was being purposefully slow.

"What?"

"If you're too good to have dinner with us," Riddle patiently explained, only it wasn't patient at all, there was an undercurrent of something that was almost rage in his voice and eyes as he looked at her, "Then you clearly think you're better than the rest of us. Why don't you sit down here with us like a good housemate?"

Harry glanced at where he was motioning, right in the middle of the pack of wolves so to speak, with Lucretia Black on one side and Crabbe's grandfather or whoever on the other. They glared across at her as if just daring her to sit next to them.

"You all look… busy," Harry replied lamely, except apparently this wasn't the right response, as the rest were starting to look insulted. They didn't want to eat with her anyway! What the hell was wrong with them?!

"Harry, as Slytherin prefect I can't in good conscious let you slink off into the shadows of solitude," he said, eyes boring into hers with more intensity than Snape had ever managed. Which how was that even possible, Snape had had the ability to read her bloody mind by staring in her eyes?

"I won't be alone," Harry said dumbly, quickly looking away from him and focusing her eyes on the safety of the emerald Slytherin banner, "I have… pie?"

Pie was about as close to real friendship in 1942 as Harry was going to get. Well, she supposed there was Alphard, and he was always very nice and good to get Tom Riddle off her back but that was… pity friendship. She was pretty sure Alphard was her pity friend who would drop her the moment she looked too troublesome or else proved capable enough to not really need him.

Though it was nice to have someone's eye to meet across the hall. Even now he was glancing up at her, eyebrows raised in confusion and a hint of concern, eyes moving almost warily to Riddle as if he was slowly but surely cluing in that Tom Riddle was the spawn of Satan and not to be trusted. She just waved back, lifted her plate of tart, and mouthed, "It's fine" across the room.

He didn't need to get involved in Harry's Halloween madness.

"Evans," Riddle said, any hint of emotion other than extreme exasperation gone from his face, "Sit down."

With that he reached over and yanked Harry into the seat on his right displacing Orion Black. As soon as Harry was sitting, he sat too, going back to his meal as if nothing had happened, even as Slughorn beamed at him in approval and his Slytherin housemates gaped at him in disbelief.

"Riddle!" Black sputtered, looking eerily like Sirius when he was about to blow up at Snape during an order meeting in that rather tense summer of 1995.

"Black," Tom responded coolly, but his eyes were colder than that, his eyes could freeze the fiery lakes of hell they were such a cold blue, "If you're about to tell me how to do my job I suggest you shove it."

Harry gaped, trying and failing to imagine a world where Tom Riddle, Voldemort in training, would tell anyone to "shove it". Granted, he'd never exactly talked like Shakespeare, but he'd always sounded so forbidding and formal.

He'd never told Harry Potter in the midst of battle to "shove it, Potter."

Apparently though, Harry thought as her head whipped towards Orion Black, it was threat enough. Black quickly swallowed whatever tirade of injustice he'd had in mind and meekly returned to his food.

Well, wasn't this awkward?

Harry stirred around dissected pieces of treacle tart on her plate, suddenly not in the mood to eat, and wondered if she might actually be relieved if a Quirrell equivalent ran in shouting about trolls in dungeons.

Harry was good at killing things like trolls, she'd killed a basilisk twice now. Dinners with her esteemed peers, now that was not her forte.

Harry spared a glance for Slughorn, who looked pleased enough with Tom Riddle's actions. In fact, they all looked appeased enough except for Dumbledore. Dumbledore looked particularly unimpressed, sparing Tom, then Harry, a dull look before returning to his own dinner and conversation with the herbology professor.

Although if Harry had to watch her own Slytherin drama she'd probably be equally unimpressed.

Still, that didn't help her figure out what the hell she was going to do now.

She supposed she could make a break for it, drop her plate and sprint out of the hall, but she had the distinct impression that she'd be paying for that later. Not just from Tom Riddle either, but all of Slytherin for the humiliation of standing them up, and Professor Slughorn out of concern for her antisocial behavior.

No, there was only one clean way out of this mess, and there was only one person to look to for escape. Tom Riddle, unacknowledged king of Slytherin and this whole bloody school.

Harry cleared her throat and looked towards the instigator of this whole mess, "So, Riddle, how long exactly am I—"

"Is Slughorn still watching?" Tom asked, and Harry glanced over at the man who was still jovially laughing with the staff members surrounding him.

"Well, not closely but—"

"Then you're stuck here until I say otherwise," Tom finished for her, as if it was a done bloody deal, then his eyes flashing as he looked over towards her and a charming grin growing on his lips, "And, you're cordially invited to the slug club tonight."

There was a general outcry from their peers, a stunned disbelief, and Harry was right there with them nearly falling out of her seat. What was he doing? He wasn't supposed to be able to do things like this! Riddle was going entirely too far and they were going to tar and feather him!

He'd just destroyed himself, lit a giant neon sign labeled "Mudblood and Mudblood Lover" over his head with a casual indifference that Harry might have respected if it wasn't Tom Riddle. Except, no, she did kind of respect it, even if it was Tom Riddle.

Hell, Harry hadn't ever been able to do something like that. It was like… If when she was twelve, she'd just walked up in front of the great hall with a microphone and said to the whole bloody school, "Oh, by the way, I am a parselmouth, thank you very much. I also do children's birthday parties and bar mitsvahs."

Or if when she'd been dateless for the Yule Ball she'd blown off equally dateless and pitiable Ron, walked straight up to Fleur Delacour, and asked her to the Yule Ball right under Cedric Diggory and Cho Chang's noses.

… She was now really regretting she hadn't done that. Except, no, Fleur probably would have rejected her right off as that was before Harry had saved Gabrielle and Fleur had thought Harry was a tiny pile of English dirt back then. Then again, if Harry had had the balls to ask her in front of everyone then Fleur might have been impressed enough to say yes.

Still, back in the surreal present Tom Riddle was cool as a cucumber even after having dropped a nuclear bomb on his social life.

"If you had the decency to make some little mudblood friends we would not be reduced to this," Riddle said pointedly at her, like this was somehow Harry's fault. When Harry didn't respond he hissed, "You will come and you will convince Slughorn that you are well enough to not require this kind of hand holding!"

And all glimmers of respect she had for Tom Riddle were gone.

"Are you bloody kidding me?!" Harry asked, unable to help herself.

How did he even keep track of all this nonsense? Harry was starting to feel like she was in some strange 1940's version of a Jane Austen novel, where every time she walked around a corner the gossips and motivations changed. No, that was exactly it, she was trapped in some sort of Jane Austen novel penned by Tom Riddle as he manipulated her circumstances to his own favor. Whatever the hell that favor even was, because she still was very confused why he would do any of this. Still, it was unbelievable how many different angles and uses Tom Riddle could get out of Slughorn's concern for her Potions score and general wellbeing.

Seriously, how was he managing this? He couldn't possibly be managing this, no one would buy it. Forcing her to sit down for the feast was one thing, but the slug club?

"Riddle's right," Malfoy drawled, in a rather impressive manner that Draco always wished he had the sophistication to pull off, "If we bite the killing curse now, we'll get it over with and we can all return to our lives without Slughorn breathing down our necks."

"You mean Riddle's neck," Orion groused, but with no real bite behind his words, more a dull resignation as if he knew he had lost this battle.

The rest hardly looked convinced, more than a few looked disdainful, but the fact that someone had spoken up in Tom Riddle's favor was not boding well for Harry's chances of quietly slipping into the night.

"No, Riddle's not right, Evans has plans tonight!" Harry spat back, because how was Malfoy in on this? Was he now glancing at Riddle for approval, giving him a small smile as if sharing in on some beautiful secret only known between the two of them, or was that just Harry's paranoid imagination?

"If you had plans tonight then I wouldn't have to do this," Tom said swiftly back, witty and charming as always even when he was being a complete ass directly to her. How had that perfect, straight, nose never been broken even once?

"Relax, everyone, remember that Riddle always has a plan," Malfoy said, emphasizing his words in the least subtle manner that Harry had ever heard, but apparently Riddle's mysterious plan was enough to convince the majority of Tom's lackies that while it probably wasn't kosher to let Harry Evans into a slug club it probably wasn't the end of the world.

"Well," Lucretia said, glaring across at Harry like she was the sad remains of a spider crushed beneath her shoe, "I don't like it."

"I don't remember saying I liked it," Harry muttered in response as she shoved treacle tart in her face. All she'd wanted was a nice quiet night to accompany her other nice quiet nights until term was over and she could flit around looking for fairies and pleading to be catapulted into the future.

The jaws of Halloween, closing in like always, but at least nothing was dead yet.

"You gave up that right, mudblood, when you jumped out the window and got Slughorn all concerned!" Orion spat towards her with a venom that, again, she'd only ever seen Sirius display towards his mad cousin or else Snape.

And Harry lost it. She slammed her plate down on the table and leaned across towards Black with anger that she had been putting off for so very long, "Oh, because it was all so very hard for you when I fell out of a window and was dying in the bushes for two days!"

"Evans, Black," Tom said coolly, cutting into slices of beef wellington as if they were all having a perfectly normal and calm dinner, "We are in a public arena, remember that."

In other words, if they wanted to kill one another they could do it behind closed doors. Which Harry could kick his ass to Wales and back if Orion Black wanted but that wasn't the point.

She didn't have to do this, no one was twisting her arm in any real sense to do this, she could stand up now and march right of here if she wanted to. Except Harry had spent her life damning the consequences of her actions and she could almost hear some voice in her head screaming, "Danger, Harry Potter! If you don't play along something terrible surely awaits you!"

Except she didn't want to play along, she had been playing along this whole time and…

Well, no, her not playing along had in a sense resulted in her current predicament of everyone thinking Harry Evans was a suicidal muggleborn mess. If she didn't go through with this, Slughorn would probably demand Riddle shadow Harry at all times or something, or else send Harry to magical therapy at Saint Mungo's where she got to talk all about her daddy issues.

No, she was stuck, and glancing over towards Tom Riddle and his smug triumphant smile he knew it just as well as she did.

Except, she thought, Harry had the great power to make a bloody mess out of nearly everything. Oh, Tom Riddle wanted her at the slug club, then he'd get Harry at the slug club and he'd reap all the misery and awkwardness that came with inviting Harry Potter to any event. Especially, she thought, one on Halloween.

Harry would destroy this little function, mortify Slytherin house so terribly they'd collectively repress all memory of her, and there was nothing Tom Riddle could do about it.

Harry lifted her glass towards Riddle, her own lips curving into a determined smile, "Alright then, since I don't appear to have a choice. Cheers, Riddle, to slug clubs."

He didn't lift his own glass, not in front of all his cool friends, but the reflections of the candles were almost dancing fondly in his eyes as he said, "Honestly, Evans, try not to embarrass yourself."

"Oh," Harry said with a smile that surprisingly didn't take too much effort to force into fondness, "Don't worry, Riddle, I plan on it."

* * *

She had not shown up in a suit but, honestly, that might have been better.

It was no secret that Harry Evans was a penniless mudblood. Of course, most wizards were unfamiliar enough with muggle culture not to be able to note the difference between muggleborns like Myrtle Warren or else Tom Riddle. To them all muggles were inherently impoverished due to their lack of magic. However, Tom was intimately aware of that world and the difference between haves and have nots.

Harry Evans' clothing was patchy and worn enough that she could have walked straight out of Wool's Orphanage with him.

As it was, Tom's wardrobe was far more varied than hers. He'd had enough forewarning to invest in secondhand suits and dress robes, if only for these events as well as the small chance he'd be invited to the home of a noble and ancient house.

Harry owned one, perhaps two, outfits outside of her school uniform and this current one was doing her no favors. The frayed beige sweater served to make her look paler, almost washed out, but at the same time heightened the color of her eyes and wild dark curls so that she was this odd alarming thing. To match her top was an equally frayed, second hand, skirt of some nondescript blue as well as a clashing pair of worn black shoes.

In other words, not only was it a far cry from formal, it clearly had been bought in a muggle flea market at bargain prices.

Malfoy had laughed, actually burst into loud guffaws and had to excuse himself to snicker into his flute of champagne, when he'd seen her walk in the door. To Malfoy it was all his idle whims of humiliating Evans presented to him on not only a silver platter but a golden one.

However, she did not look humiliated.

There was no shame in her when she'd thrown open the doors to Slughorn's office, no, she'd looked for him and she'd grinned with determination and anticipation. As if, simply by having coerced her into coming, he had made the greatest mistake of his life and would soon realize it.

True, she'd brushed him off almost immediately for the punch bowl, and then soon enough for Alphard Black who had to be about as interesting as a bowl of punch but none the less Tom was…

Well, perhaps pleased was too strong of a word, but he wasn't put out that she wasn't flushing in humiliation or else storming out of the room. He'd seen that once before already, after all, and it had… He'd expected to get over that, and he had, but even now memories of seeing her back as she stormed out of the castle hit him with an unexpected leaden feeling in his stomach.

"Tom, my boy," a hand fell on his shoulder, looking over Tom saw Slughorn looking at him with an expression that was torn between approval and concern, "Orion tells me it's you who invited…"

Slughorn didn't finish, just motioned over towards Harry, Alphard, and the truly monopolized punch bowl.

"Ah," Tom said for a moment as, Harry with perfect timing as ever, snorted out punch as Alphard Black finished a joke. For a moment Alphard simply stared at her in dumb horror while Harry covered her mouth and nose in embarrassment, and then the pair were laughing like lunatics together. Finally, blinking, Tom finished his thought, "Yes."

Slughorn nodded absently, approval giving way to concern as he stared at her, and then he said slowly, "You know, Tom, I do appreciate the lengths you are going to for Miss Evans' acclimatization—"

Oh, he knew where this was going.

"Thank you, sir," Tom said swiftly, hoping to cut the man off before he could start, or worse she might look over and see. He felt himself fighting off a mortified flush, as if he'd been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. No, more like he'd been caught in the act of lynching Billy Stubb's rabbit by drunken Mrs. Cole.

Tom Riddle had cultivated himself to be the kind of student who, while he would be polite to Harry Evans, would never invite her over for dinner.

"However, remember, Tom, that you can't be held entirely responsible for what has happened or what is going to happen," Slughorn finished meaningfully, speaking over Tom and meeting his eyes as he said with a sense of finality, "Some people, Tom, are not truly worth helping to our fullest abilities."

Tom had nothing to say.

For perhaps the first time in his life there was a sort of white noise in the back of his head and no thoughts at all to spill out of his lips.

While he was standing there in a kind of comatose daze Slughorn just kept talking and that white noise got louder with each word.

"You have tried very hard, and I have seen remarkable improvement in terms of her Potions grades and Professor Binns has spoken well of her recent efforts in History. Certainly, your tutoring efforts have not gone to waste. However, there is a lesson to be learned from this."

"A lesson, sir?" Tom asked numbly.

"We cannot give our all in every situation," Slughorn said with a sort of smug pompousness, "We must divide our time and effort to worthy causes. This, I'm afraid, is a lesson many of our Hufflepuff friends never learn."

"I thought, sir," Tom said slowly, eyes drifting from Slughorn to linger on Evans, and for once his voice was cold and devoid of all pleasantness when dealing with this man, "That you were unhappy with how she was being treated at the feast tonight."

"Oh, yes, yes of course," Slughorn said, now flustered and embarrassed by the idea that he'd blow off his own suicidal student, "And thank you for intervening, but Tom, my boy, the feast is not the slug club."

No, the Halloween feast was not the slug club, Tom thought to himself drily. Here he had the great joy of watching Orion Black brood in a corner with champagne, Lucretia Black whisper with Abraxas while glancing and Alphard and Harry, Crabbe, Goyle, Potter, everyone and their bloody brother well on their way to getting aristocratically smashed for the occasion.

The feast, in its openness and unexclusive nature at least had some dignity. This, this hobnobbing with the Hogwarts upper crust, well Tom thought that the name "slug club" suited it quite well at the end of things.

It was filled, after all, with the proverbial vermin of the school.

No, the likes of Harry Evans did not belong in their poisoned, slug filled, garden.

Still, Tom Riddle was Tom Riddle, and all he could do was grit his teeth into a pleasant smile, "Thank you, sir, I'll keep that in mind."

"Good, good," Slughorn said, patting Tom Riddle consolingly on the shoulder while his attention wandered to Harry, "At least she's enjoying herself, Merlin knows it's probably the only chance she'll ever have to enjoy one of my get-togethers."

Slughorn's two cents said, the man then wandered off towards Orion Black, likely to try and cheer up the heir leaving Tom, for the moment, on his own. As always, his attention wandered back to her.

They weren't matching, not in the least, Tom was in dark dress robes charmed to disguise the poor quality of the cloth and use of growth charms. Look closely and you'd see right through him, however, he looked the part when she took great part in looking anything but.

She was a sore, casual, thumb amidst floor gowns and suits. Chugging non-alcoholic punch while the rest sipped red-faced at their champagne. She looked, as always, quintessentially like herself and so much more honest and vibrant for it.

He wondered if she'd ever tried to lie with her expression alone. If she had ever smiled or frowned without truly meaning it. He could see her paltry attempts now, the bizarre twisting of her lips into a severe grimace that was trying its best to pass as a smile. More, no matter what strange shapes her mouth would make, her eyes would always betray her just as they did now.

"Riddle," A voice hissing in his ear, and blinking Tom found himself surrounded on both sides by Malfoy and Lucretia Black.

"Riddle, don't tell me you've already done it," Malfoy said, nodding pointedly towards the damnable pair in question. Then, with a look of disgust towards them, he added, "Good Merlin, look at him go."

"Alfie forgets himself," Lucretia said with a contemptuous sniff, "He also has fondness for pitiable and masculine things."

Tom felt his brow rise at that, as that had felt like an oddly pointed insult, but he let it go as he quietly resigned himself to the only excuse that had brought Harry Evans into this room, "Not yet."

"Then what are you waiting for?" Malfoy asked, "Don't forget that I—"

"I know," Tom said, effectively cutting off whatever rant he'd had in store about all the sacrifices poor Abraxas Malfoy had made for this moment.

"Abraxas won't tell me what you have planned, Riddle," Lucretia said, leaning up to whisper in his ear, "But he assures me that it will make the eyesore's presence more than worth it."

She really was an eyesore tonight, wasn't she? Yet, for all of that, every unwilling eye was drawn towards her in a way that Tom might have envied a few months ago. They disparaged and mocked her, but tonight they would remember her name and remember that against all expectations she had been at Slughorn's slug club among Hogwart's top cadre.

As if, for a moment, she had belonged among them as much as Tom Riddle.

So why did he feel like she was slipping through his fingers?

"Riddle!"

What would she do? What would she do when all of Tom's scheming to get her here was unfurled? When he publicly humiliated her for the second time with Alphard, Abraxas, Crabbe, and Goyle once again as witnesses to her shame what would she do?

Would she look at him with the same sort of empty numbness that he currently felt?

Would she laugh? Would she once again be the only one to see through any of it and laugh at all of the tangled webs Tom wove for such little reward?

Or would she do nothing at all but simply shrug her shoulders and agree to it? All's well that ends well, she might say, and then that would be that.

"What are you waiting for?" Lucretia prompted him, dark eyes now with a touch of wary concern in them, as if she truly had no idea what was pouring through his head.

"Nothing," Tom said, straightening his back and building his resolve, "Just wondering if it might be worth waiting until the end."

It felt like an ending, the jaws of Voldemort closing in on him two years too early, so that he didn't have time to mourn or even lose Tom Riddle properly but instead became a faceless pureblood papier-mâché mask. All of this was tied not in his graduation, but in this single moment as he approached Slughorn with a small request the man would eagerly grant.

Walking back over to Slughorn, now amiably chatting with seventh year Charlus Potter and his fiancée Dorea Black, he felt as if it was both the shortest and longest walk of his life. And strangely, though he had no reason to, he hoped she would prove him wrong as she always had.

That tonight, just like every other moment he met with her, Harry Evans would surpass all expectations he had of her and that something unexpected might come of this.

* * *

 **Author's Note: Will Tom be a conflicted dick as usual? Will Harry do something completely unexpected? Will Alphard actually get any dialogue despite being mentioned quite a bit in the last two chapters? Will someone other than Harry and Tom have anything significant to say at all? What disaster will befall our unsuspecting cast members as the doom of Harry Potter + Halloween approaches? Find out next chapter!**

 **Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are most appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	11. Chapter 11

_"Harry, you're going to have to try and find a way of not expressing every feeling that you have, every moment that you have them."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _October 1942_

* * *

"Jesus," Harry said into her glass of fruit punch, "What in the bloody hell am I doing here?"

At least, she thought it was fruit punch; she never really could tell with these fancy wizard drinks. Sure, Harry was technically pureblood and all, and had spent the past six years mostly in the wizarding world, but most of the time she felt kind of like a tourist. Ron always knew so much more about everything, took things for granted, while Harry would have to sit there and stare at her drink and wonder if that was really an eyeball floating in there or someone's idea of a joke.

The point was, it was some kind of punch, and ever since Harry had waltzed into the place ready for Halloween to come and get her, it had been calling her name. And it was delicious, and also right next to the food, which Harry hadn't really touched but she'd get around to it eventually.

That, and there was a kind of delicious sense of joy that buzzed through her at the idea that since Harry was next to the punch and the food, she effectively prevented anyone from stepping near it with her dirt-poor muggleborn presence. Orion Black had taken one look at her, standing by herself next to punchy delight, blanched, and turned away to nurse his champagne.

Harry had just waved right back.

God, how could someone who looked so much like Sirius be such a dick? Well, a dick to anyone besides Snape, that is. Harry would admit that Sirius had kind of been a giant dick to Snape back in the day, and that this may have bitten Harry in the ass.

But, you know, semantics.

"Well, you told me that Tom Riddle invited you at dinner because he found you sad," Alphard responded, the one man who had dared to step close to her and the punch without an ounce of shame in his body.

Not even Minerva McGonagall, young and proud, had stepped near her (spared Harry an eyebrow or two, a glance at the Slytherins, then a nod that could have meant 'you go girl' or else 'well, you're here I guess') or else an older boy who might have even been Harry's grandfather.

No, Harry was the elephant in the room, dutifully ignored by all involved even if that meant giving up punch and hors d'oeuvres.

Alphard looked good, dressed in similar black impeccable robes as his numerous cousins; gone was his normally somewhat ruffled bookish look, replaced with slicked back hair. His smile, though, was the same, as were his eyes—a pale sort of silver that crinkled at the corners when he smiled. There was nothing sly about it, nothing sharp or hidden. It was a plain and simple smile without the slightest bit of arrogance.

Harry wasn't sure she'd ever seen another smile quite like it.

"Sure," Harry said in response, eyes flicking to Tom Riddle, who was now looking like he was having a truly awkward conversation with Slughorn. Not that Slughorn noticed, but Tom Riddle looked ready to kill either the Potions professor or else himself out of sheer embarrassment and rage.

He was probably getting the sex talk.

Harry had personally never gotten the sex talk at Hogwarts, it'd kind of just never happened, but she could see Slughorn getting creepily invested in that sort of thing. That, and the idea of Tom being told about the birds and the bees by Slughorn of all people, at this ridiculous party, filled her with a delightful sort of joy.

He deserved that.

"But you know, that's kind of a lame excuse," Harry finished, forcing her attention back towards Alphard, "I mean, pity is nodding at me in Potions, or maybe offering pity-tutoring if you're really stretching it. I'm pretty sure even Slughorn thinks the Slug Club is too good for me."

He'd looked… more than a little shocked when Harry had walked through the door. She'd spared no hesitation in telling him that Tom Riddle had invited her as she'd made her way to the food.

"Well, I'm glad you're here," Alphard said, sounding genuine enough, but Harry still glanced at him warily out of the corner of her eyes.

"Thanks, Alphard. You're a good bloke, but you really don't have to do this," Harry finally said with a sigh. She then motioned to the table she was standing next to, "I mean, I know I've blocked off the food and punch, but you really don't have to do this. You have my express permission to get to the truffles and get the hell out of dodge."

He just looked at her for a moment, with an odd sort of fondness that Harry had come to associate with Tom Riddle of all people. "Harry, why do you do that?"

"Do what?" Harry asked as she took another sip of punch, if only so she didn't have to look directly at him.

He didn't seem to mind, though, and waited for her to finish before he spoke again, "Why are you convinced that I'm forcing myself to talk to you?"

Harry blinked, blinked again, and wondered what universe he'd been living in for the past two months, then asked, "Well, aren't you?"

"No," he said, shaking his head with a smile, "Not in the slightest."

"Well," Harry said as she looked down at herself, motioning to her clothing then to the rest of the glittering party, "You have to admit I don't exactly belong here."

Not just in this room, in Professor Slughorn's overdecorated-office-turned-salon, but in 1942's Hogwarts in general. It was… she didn't know if she'd admitted it out loud in such simple terms before. Harry Potter, no, Harry Evans, didn't belong in this world. Something she couldn't quite put her finger on, more than being muggleborn and more than having no money, separated her from everyone else. Everywhere she went she chafed at her surroundings and they chafed at her.

They wouldn't be sorry, she thought, to see the back of her.

"No, you don't belong here," Alphard agreed quietly, looking past her and into the party as well with a soft hidden longing, "But you do it with a style that I can only envy."

"Style?" Harry asked, but he didn't look as if he was doubting his word choice or judgement, even if Harry was doing it for him. If there was one thing Harry had never had, it was style. She'd never lived up to her own epitaphs, in her own humble opinion.

"I didn't say grace or elegance," Alphard said, causing Harry to frown and wonder if she should be insulted by that very accurate statement, "But you do have your own way of doing things which I've never seen you compromise. Not even for this place."

Black motioned towards his peers, out towards the Gryffindor half of the room. "Anyone else in your shoes, Harry, would have dressed to the nines. Anyone else would have immediately ingratiated themselves with Professor Slughorn, then gone on to make nice with Potter and Dorea. That you're a Slytherin only means you would have done it with more subtlety and flare. Anyone else, Harry Evans, would have known their place."

"And I don't?" Harry asked, giving him a well-earned chuckle, which had him laughing in turn.

"Oh, you know it, but you embrace it with a passion that no one here would ever dare to." Then, motioning towards her with a small bow as if she were royalty, he said, "You, Harry Evans, are the very heart and soul of the party."

"Glad to be of service," Harry said, shaking her head. He was… He wasn't really like Hermione either—Harry guessed she had to stop comparing all the bookish smart people she met to her best friend, but he wasn't. He had a drier wit, not quite Tom Riddle's razor-sharp tongue, but a softer and quieter equally sardonic thing.

He seemed at home in quiet places, out of the spotlight, an introvert at his finest. There was none of Hermione's righteous fury in him, but a quiet and more tempered soul.

Which made it both odd and not odd at all that he'd come to stand by her. Because here he wouldn't be bothered by anyone else, sure, but every eye was certainly on him.

Harry considered him again, considered his last name and the little she knew of Alphard Black from Sirius, then asked, "Alphard, are we friends?"

He paused for a moment, considered her in turn, as if the question had caught him off guard. "I suppose we are."

"Are you sure?" Harry said, "Because we don't have to be friends."

"I'm quite sure," he said, this time with far more confidence, "I think… I would very much like to be friends with you, Harry Evans."

"Dear god, why?" Harry attempted to restrain her hands from making wild gestures and spilling punch everywhere. Still, first Riddle and now him, what was wrong with everyone?

"Why?" he asked, equally flummoxed at her asking him in turn.

"Alphard, if you haven't noticed, I'm not very popular. In fact, I think standing within five feet of me instantly gets the gossipmongers going and gives you the risk of catching social leprosy. I know this is all very Slytherin, but you, especially you, don't have anything to gain by being my friend and a hell of a lot of flack to put up with for doing it. And I'm kind of a mess, I mean I know I'm a mess, but I really am a mess—"

"Harry—" he tried to interject, but Harry was on a roll, it was all just flooding out of her now.

"And no one really likes me. I mean when they have reason to, sure, we love Harry, except they'll flip-flop as soon as anyone tells them to, but when I'm nobody, forget it. And if you had any sense at all you'd stay away from the garbage that is my life and just let me quietly sink into a hole in the ground where I'll rot for fifty years like a time capsule—"

"Harry," he said more forcefully, actually grabbing her shoulders and squeezing them as he stared into her eyes, "Breathe!"

"Breathing," Harry said quietly, watching as he slowly released her and left her to awkwardly sip punch. Still, at least she'd made her point, that Harry Potter was a hot mess that nobody in their right mind would want to touch.

"Harry, I am not friends with you because of what it will or won't do to my standing with my family or anyone else in this school," he said quietly, with a soft sort of intensity and bitterness that she didn't quite understand, "I know perfectly well where I stand, where I would stand if I possessed even a tenth of your courage and conviction."

"Courage?" Harry asked, trying to remember when the last time was that she'd been courageous, at least where Alphard Black might see. The biggest impression she'd made on him was fighting in the hallway with Tom Riddle and then fleeing to jump out a window.

And Harry wouldn't have labeled any of that as being particularly courageous or overflowing with conviction.

Still, he didn't take back his words, just kept looking at her with that fond and almost awed smile. "I want to be your friend, Harry. I want to stand next to you with the punch bowl at these god awful parties that I wish I didn't have to attend."

Harry took that in, nodding, not entirely sure what to say to that. It was really the most touching proclamation of friendship she'd ever heard. She and Ron had just sort of meshed together (well, he'd been nice enough on the train and Harry had clung to that with all the power she had) and Hermione had come into the picture with the giant troll; no one had ever said anything like that before.

She really didn't know what to say.

So instead, looking at him, she asked the question that was now at the forefront of her mind, "So, does anyone actually want to be here right now? Or are we all just kind of faking it?"

He laughed, not just chuckled or tittered politely, but actually broke down into hysterical laughter like that was the funniest shit he'd ever heard in his life. Which, it wasn't that funny, it wasn't even a joke because she really was wondering if any of them wanted to be here. She was pretty sure Riddle hated these things too, and that half the reason he wanted her here was to share the pain. Harry certainly wasn't having the time of her life even if she had technically shown up of her own free will.

Finally, Alphard got a hold of himself, straightened, and said, "Promise me, Harry, that you'll never change."

"Well, I haven't so far," Harry said, which for a normal person probably didn't mean much, but Harry had faced more trials and tribulations than your average teenage girl. Had made more… damning decisions and faced more consequences than many would in their entire lives. She'd come out unscathed, mostly, but she'd mostly remained herself through thick and thin.

Chances were Harry would always be Harry until the very end, whenever that came.

Looking out into the small, glittering crowd, she caught eye of Riddle again. He was dressed more conservatively, and in Harry's eye a bit more fashionably, than most. Simple, dark robes that complimented his tall figure. Plus, with his face he could wear whatever the hell he wanted and get away with it.

More worrying, though, was that he had both Malfoy and Lucretia Black whispering in his ear and looking straight at her. Malfoy, plus the flirty Black, plus Riddle, plus looking at Harry like they were anticipating something monumental, did not equal Harry's idea of a good time.

"Oh, bloody hell," Harry said softly, more to herself than anything else, but Alphard nevertheless turned to look at her as Harry lamely explained, "I think I may have figured out why I was invited."

Alphard followed the direction of her gaze, and a sort of dull resignation fell over his expression as he caught sight of the unholy trio. "Don't pay them any mind. Malfoy and my cousin have no imagination, and Riddle has no soul."

"Oh, hey," Harry said, spluttering as her head whipped towards Alphard in complete and utter shock, "That's a new opinion from you! I thought you were all for Team Riddle."

"You've since convinced me otherwise," Alphard said with a sort of dark underlying bitterness that Harry wouldn't have expected from him, "He does an exceptional job of appearing as whatever you wish him to be, except, of course, when you're involved."

Well, Harry hadn't expected that. She was floored, really; the party seemed to disappear entirely as her mind whirled. When had he changed his mind? Had he always thought this way but just hadn't wanted to tell her? What had happened that had convinced him? And why was Harry now feeling ever so slightly guilty, a sudden urge to say that Riddle wasn't really all that bad you know? Had she been corrupted somehow? Had some point between creating a Patronus, slaying a basilisk, changed her or had it changed him? Was he really the same Tom Riddle she'd met when she was twelve? He couldn't perform the same acts of evil, but if he could then would he?

Harry hadn't really wanted to change anything, change him—except that she had? Or else, maybe she hadn't, maybe he really was that good and it took Alphard Black to remind her that Riddle was never what he seemed.

Even when he promised her life until 1981, a life free from the constant threat of death by his hand, he wasn't what he promised.

Harry opened her mouth to say something; what that was, she didn't know. Maybe that they could form some sort of a club of the enlightened Hogwarts students not snowed by Riddle, or else that Riddle sometimes wasn't the spawn of Satan, but just as soon she closed it, because the devil himself was walking straight towards them.

He looked determined, he looked as if he wanted to look disdainful but couldn't quite manage it, and instead had a panicked edge to his glance that Harry had only ever seen in the diary in those very last moments. Finally, he stopped in front of them, all polite smiles. "Black, Evans."

"Riddle," Alphard responded with a curt but polite enough nod.

"I've just spoken with Slughorn," Riddle said, nodding towards the jovial little man who had apparently been distracted by Minerva McGonagall, "He should be coming over soon enough."

"Great," Harry said, because she seemed to be missing whatever was significant about Professor Slughorn coming over to chat with the three of them specifically. Except that whatever it was probably wasn't good news, was probably Halloween in effect, as Malfoy and Lucretia were now giggling together like schoolgirls.

"Was there something you needed?" Black asked, far more pointedly, and with enough venom that Tom Riddle actually gave him a rather knowing glance. As if, for the first time, he saw more than just a tool at his disposal but something to take stock of.

"Actually, yes, but it's a little more complicated than that—"

Whatever else he was going to say was cut off by Slughorn finally arriving. "Oh, sorry about that Tom, I just had to talk a little Quidditch with Minerva. The Gryffindor team is doing very well this year, jolly good. Now, onto business, though you know I hate mixing business with social affairs."

"Quite," Riddle said, if only because none of the rest of them were going to say it and Slughorn looked like the sort of man who needed to be constantly indulged.

God, how did Riddle stand it?

"Well, Tom and I have been talking and, Tom you should tell the poor girl—" Slughorn said, suddenly looking a bit embarrassed as he looked at her. Which, wow, that was a new low. Harry was now so embarrassing that she was causing other people to be embarrassed.

She was almost proud of herself.

"Harry, I'm afraid I've overestimated how much free time I have this term," Tom said, looking quite apologetic (which just had the background hushed snickering raise in volume), "I know you're still struggling in Potions and History of Magic, but I'm afraid I don't have time for our tutoring sessions."

What. In. The. Bloody. Hell?

Had Harry heard that right?

"What?" She couldn't help it, the word just fell out of her mouth like a rock. She could almost see it rolling on the floor amidst the laughter and glances of her esteemed peers.

"No, no wait a minute," Harry said, holding her hands and drink up, "Back up here. You're quitting our tutoring sessions."

"I'm afraid so," he said, with all the sympathy as if he'd just told her that her grandmother was dying of cancer.

"You, as in you and not me, are quitting our tutoring sessions," Harry said, now pointing straight at his chest with her eyebrows raising as it was actually starting to sink in, "You're unbelievable, you are actually un-bloody-believable. I do not even comprehend how you are a living, breathing, human being."

He went through all of this, all of this ridiculous trouble, to get her in tutoring sessions because he was too manly to waste her time working on their end of term project (which they hadn't even talked about since that blow up in the hallway) and now he was calling it off yet again in front of all his cool friends.

Harry just didn't even know where to start.

"Miss Evans," Slughorn cut in, apparently appalled at her behavior, "I know this is sudden and I know you feel—"

"No, it's cool," Harry said, gesturing for peace with a strained smile, "I am very cool with this. Mr. Riddle, you may consider yourself a free man."

Something flashed in his eyes, something dark and more than a little dangerous, but then it was gone in an instant and that sympathetic and knowing look remained. Like he was sure Harry was going to break down and cry as soon as she was out of this room because she wouldn't be seeing Tom Riddle two times a week.

Really, she'd be having a goddamn fiesta is what she'd be having.

"Regardless," Slughorn said, "Tom here noted you still have room for improvement, and I agree in Potions at least, so for the immediate future we thought that Alphard here might be willing to step in."

Alphard paused for a moment, looked to Tom, whose face had gone unnaturally still (eerily so, really), then back to Slughorn. Alphard offered a polite, thin smile as he said, "I'd be delighted, professor."

Slughorn laughed like all was solved and he could now get back to what was clearly the best damn party of the year. "Good, then that's all settled. I'll leave you and Miss Evans here to work out your schedules."

And it probably would have been settled too; Harry would have gone back to the punch, might have remarked to Alphard that that was a little weird, and that would have been that. Except, as usual, the forces of Halloween and the Harry Potter effect conspired together to make the impossible and unexpected suddenly possible.

So that Harry Potter's name, even though she'd avoided the Goblet like the plague, was suddenly coming out of blue fire. So that trolls were spontaneously appearing in dungeons. So that Harry was suddenly having epileptic seizures on the floor starring Voldemort prince of darkness.

Or, in this case, so that Tom Marvolo Riddle lost his goddamn mind.

You know, the usual Halloween garbage.

* * *

It was when she turned.

She turned from him, not particularly slowly but not swiftly either, instead with a speed that implied perfect and utter indifference, towards Alphard Black.

It was at that moment, when her eyes completely left his, when he was left to Slughorn's tender mercies and the rest of the party, that he started laughing. As he'd stepped in front of her, smiled at her and Black, as she'd raised her eyebrows at him and seemed to ask 'What is wrong with you?' when he'd told her that it was ending, it'd been as if he'd been dangling on the edge of a precipice.

And now the pit was swallowing him whole and he just couldn't do it anymore.

"Tom?" Slughorn asked, laying a hand on his shoulder, as if he was Tom's father or had any right to act as any sort of legitimate figure of authority in Tom's life. Tom knocked it off and found himself aware that, as his laughter died down, he was chanting over and over, "I can't do it anymore."

And he couldn't, he felt nauseous, he felt like everything was falling on his head and he just couldn't do it anymore.

He wasn't just tired, he was panicked, and all he could think of was her turning away from him and that that was it. Congratulations Tom, that's at least the next two years if not longer than that. Because let's be honest, Tom old boy, what really waits for you outside of these walls?

Voldemort, sure, but how long will that take to get up and running? You have no money, you have no real ties, you have only the knowledge you've managed to cram in your head inside these walls as well as your pretty face. How much is that worth out there?

It could be ten or twenty years before Voldemort hatches out of the cocoon known as Tom Riddle.

"Riddle, honestly—" This was Abraxas, a hissed veiled threat, that Tom could not lose his composure like this in front of all of them. That if Tom dared to tarnish himself, even slightly, it was the end for him in Slytherin and he'd never have the power he once had ever again.

"Don't touch me!" he said, knocking Abraxas back, not simply with his hands but aided by wandless magic so that Abraxas slammed into the other wall.

"Don't," Tom said brokenly, straightening out of his hunched posture, "Touch me."

Then, casting his gaze around the room, seeing horrified and stunned faces all around, he asked, "Oh, what are you looking at? You'd think you've never seen honesty before in your life. Then again, I don't think any of you have."

"Not you," he said motioning to the Gryffindors, moving to the Hufflepuffs, the Ravenclaws, and finally his brethren, the Slytherin, "Not you either, not you, and certainly not you."

Only her, only Harry Evans had ever been painfully, truly honest with any of them, and how she suffered for it. How he'd thought her a fool for it.

He laughed again, unable to help it. "Well, let's be honest now, shall we? I hate all of you."

He whirled then, towards Abraxas, who was picking himself up shaking from the wall, pale and afraid as he had been years ago after cornering a young Tom Riddle in a hallway. "You, Abraxas, who is at once so eager to please me and seek my approval in everything you do, and look down at me for the mudblood trash I surely am. You, who bases everything you do not on talent, not on wit, but merely on pedigree and wealth! I have loathed you and your kind since before I ever saw your face."

"And you, Lucretia," Tom said, motioning to her as she looked at him with wide dark eyes even as she helped Abraxas to his feet, "Oh, you are a special brand of despicable, aren't you? Playing hard to get, the flirt, but of course you'd never actually take Tom Riddle out in the open, but you might do it in a broom closet on the sly now and then. If, provided, he lacked the shame!"

"Potter," Tom said, with a laugh, unable to stop himself now that it was all flooding out, pointing wildly at a glaring Charlus Potter and his fiancée Dorea, "Oh, you like to tell yourself you're the progressive sort, don't you? But tell me, would you ever invite the likes of me, the likes of Evans over here to dinner? And there was no hesitation from the Black family to join with yours, was there? No, rank hypocrisy is your name just as it's the name of every noble and ancient house outside of Slytherin's tender claws!"

"Tom, my boy, why don't you go sit—"

"And you, Professor," Tom said, whirling towards Slughorn nervously moving towards him again, like Tom was some cornered beast, "You deserve your own special circle in Hell, I believe. Youngest minister of magic, you told me that once, but do you really believe that? You know I have no future as much as I do, no, you know it more intimately than I do. That the best chance I have, the only chance I have, is coming to these damned parties and licking the boots of my betters! A great opportunity, you said, two years ago now! And what a great opportunity it has been—you have always insisted and basked in my gratitude for it! Because we aren't all Slug Club material here; some of us, after all, will never be worthy of such honor!"

Finally, he turned towards the pair of the hour, Alphard Black and Harry Evans. His hand was on her shoulder, comforting or else restraining, but all Tom could see was how natural they looked together. They didn't match any more than he and Harry did, but something about them clicked together in a way that stabbed right through Tom's heart.

"And what do I say about you two?" he asked himself, raising his hands towards them, "What can I possibly say about you?"

He laughed, laughed at how they glared at him as if they were just daring him to do his worst when everyone else was trembling beneath the force of his unleashed rage and magic rattling the glass and books off their cases. "Well, I can say that you're the only two that really don't belong in this place, if only because you actually have integrity. Alphard Black and Harry Evans, the only two in this whole damned school who put up no pretense, and don't we love them for it? Evans is only here out of pity or else public humiliation, they really go hand in hand these days, and Black, oh Alfie Black the black sheep, where do we even start with you?"

"And you know what?" Tom asked, his voice soft and quietly dangerous in a way that it had not been in years, "I think I hate you most of all for that. That you have the nerve, the audacity, to be honest in a place like this. Where do you think you are, Harry Evans? Don't you know that there's a role you should be playing?! Don't you know that they expect something from you, that you have left them waiting for months, and that they will never forgive you for it?!"

He stopped, looked away from her burning too-knowing eyes and instead towards the glittering crystal chandeliers. "And I hate that because of that, because of you, I can't do this anymore! Five years now I have played this game, five years, only two more to go and I simply can't! You have ruined me, Harry Evans!"

With that he forced himself away, wrenched himself away from the stunned staring and the silence, forced himself out of the party and into the hallway, letting the doors slam behind him as he raced out of the Slug Club and the castle as well. Out, he had to get out, he had to get out now or else the pit that was his façade would swallow him whole and there'd be nothing left of him.

Nothing left but the charade, the mask, that he'd spent so thoughtlessly long crafting.

* * *

 **Author's Notes: The other title of this chapter: "RIDDLE SMASH". Ah Tom, you do have mental breakdowns with style.**

 **Thanks to GlassGirlCeci for betaing the chapter.**

 **Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	12. Chapter 12

_"Tell me I'll never have to be out there again."_

 _"You will never have to be out there again."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _October, 1942_

* * *

"Holy shit." Harry really couldn't help it, it just slipped out of her mouth, much in the same way that Tom Riddle had just slipped out of the party with the mother of all awkward silences in his wake.

She wasn't much better, though; she and everyone else was staring out the door with their jaws hanging open, as if they were just waiting for him to reappear and say it was all a joke. Or, more likely, for him to have just been standing there the whole time and it was some kind of mass hallucination.

Tom Riddle didn't do that, he wasn't allowed to do that, he wasn't allowed to…

She didn't even know what, but whatever it was that she had just witnessed, he was not allowed to do it. Except he had, and the door was still closed, and Harry was finally able to close her mouth and admit, "I don't think he's coming back."

She had thought…

She didn't know what she'd thought about the young Tom Riddle before coming here. In the diary he'd been so put together, so charming, and in the Chamber he had as well. It'd been easy to imagine that he'd have everyone and their brother eating out of his hands during Hogwarts in a way that Harry would simply never be able to.

And he had, she was sure he had, except he had just…

"Oh, hell," Harry said, because there it was, that warm, uncomfortable churning in her stomach that was crying out that something, somewhere, was wrong and that Harry should go and fix it. Even when it wasn't her problem, even when he was Tom Riddle, because Tom Riddle was sad now and maybe it was Harry's fault?

"Oh, bloody hell," Harry repeated, rubbing at her forehead which, now that she realized it, was starting to get that familiar stabbing pain that came with Voldemort's bottomless rage. Except this time it wasn't just rage; there was a sense of overwhelming despair as well, something she'd never really felt from Voldemort back in the good old days.

"Harry, are you alright?" Alphard was looking at her, not at the door, as if Tom Riddle's grand finale held no interest for him anymore.

Everyone, Harry saw, was picking up the pieces now. Slughorn lost his subdued, shocked look and had now turned to Orion Black and was discussing, as far as Harry could tell, Tom's poor health and what the stress of OWL exams could do to a person. Malfoy and Lucretia Black had turned to sneering in contempt, sniffing, and writing Tom off undoubtedly as a lost cause they never should have bothered with.

Rumors would fly throughout the school, would sound along with his every footstep, and Tom Riddle was about to become infamous for something other than a mysterious service to the school.

And Harry, even without the mother of all migraines, could empathize.

Play it cool, Harry Potter, it's just your saving people thing acting up again. You know, that thing you have that makes you run into certain death about every May because you know nobody else is going to and Dumbledore's always out of the castle. That thing, you just have to learn to ignore it, because the people in this case is Tom Marvolo Riddle, the secret incarnation of evil.

Tom Riddle, who could cast a Patronus, had a personality that wasn't saccharine charming, was actually kind of funny, the only person who seemed to like her even when he hated her, forgave her for murdering his giant snake friend, and while an overdramatic high maintenance diva was not the pure evil concentrate she had been led to believe.

But that didn't make him people worthy of the gut-churning, sweat-inducing saving people thing.

She could do this, she could ignore this, she could ignore this just like she ignored…

"Oh, hell," Harry said, louder this time, ignoring Alphard's more alarmed look as Harry realized that no, she had never ignored it.

That time Dudley had gotten attacked by dementors, yeah, Harry was right there with him and facing expulsion only a few days later. Or that time when, after rescuing Ron from watery death in the second task, she'd decided one wasn't enough and she should go back for Gabrielle too. Or that time in her first time through fifth year when Hermione had voluntold her to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts in a secret rebellion against Umbridge.

Point being, Harry couldn't think of a time she'd actively said, "Nope," and walked away from anyone's problem.

Granted, it had never been Tom Riddle's bullshit problems before, but…

"Harry, why are you grimacing?"

Harry sighed in defeat. "Look, Alphard, I should get going. I have a really bad headache."

"A headache?" he asked, eyebrows raising, and then motioned to Slughorn, "Do you want me to—"

"No, no," Harry said, waving her hands, "It's not that kind of a headache."

Not that Snape had ever offered her potions during one of her weekly epileptic fits following Voldemort's resurrection, but the ones Madame Pomfrey had coughed up had done jack shit. Plus, after Voldemort calmed down (if he calmed down), they would disappear almost as quickly as they came.

"It's not that kind of a headache," Alphard repeated, looking as if he was not sure if he should be fond or just dubious. He was kind of settling for a weird mix of both.

"It's fine, really, I just, I should go," Harry said, motioning to the door, "This isn't my scene anyway, and now that Riddle has gone and upstaged me I can't embarrass anyone with my presence. So… You know… I kind of just want to go and grab some pie."

She should have just gone and eaten the damn treacle tart to begin with and skipped this whole mess. Still, Harry started edging backwards, away from the punch, food, and Alphard Black, who was just standing there as if he really had no idea what was happening.

"But wait, when should I meet you?" he asked, stepping with her as she slowly made her way out of Slughorn's office.

"Meet me?" she asked, having no idea what the hell he was talking about.

"For the tutoring, remember? Riddle just quit."

Oh, right, that ridiculous thing before he'd done his ridiculous other thing. Had he… Was this somehow because of that? Had he not wanted Harry to just smile and nod? But what had he been expecting? Harry had been trying to quit that garbage since before he started!

God, he was such a hot mess!

"Right, well, I'm here all week?" Harry said, though hesitantly. To tell the truth, she was alarmingly free without Quidditch or DA monopolizing her schedule. "Tuesdays and Thursdays are still good."

"I'll see you Tuesday, then," he said, and he grinned, a full-fledged smile as if he was really looking forward to sitting down with Harry and correcting her mediocre Potions homework and even worse History homework (the terrible thing about Binns being alive was that he was still boring as all hell but now he could actually grade).

And with that, Harry was out the door and shutting it closed with a sense of finality.

"Right, I'm never going to one of those again," she said to herself with a smile. Lord, it really was the worst. Alphard was nice and all, surprisingly so really, but good god, the rest of it. It was like the essence of Draco Ferret Malfoy condensed into a single room. Everything had glittered and shone, everyone had the kind of smarmy accent you could only obtain when you were filthy rich and liked it that way, and it was the kind of place that made you feel like you were covered in dirt and there were holes in your sweater.

It was, in short, everything Harry hated about Slytherin.

Maybe that was what Riddle felt like.

"Oh boy," Harry said with a sigh, slumping against the door. She didn't need to be thinking these kind of thoughts. Couldn't Tom Riddle stay in his own bubble while she stayed in hers? They'd done that for a few weeks; it had been nice. She missed that.

Still, Riddle had been stuck in that place for years, forced to grin and bear it and claw his way to the top. And that could get to anyone; Harry didn't know if she could have lasted as long as he must have.

"Harry, why do you have to do this?!" she cried to the empty hallway, tearing at her hair and stepping forward, "Why can't you just be a normal person?!"

It was too late, though; she was already walking, following her gut instinct that would somehow lead her to a very sad and angry Tom Riddle who was probably sitting on a log and…

"No, he wouldn't."

Would he really go and sit in the exact same spot that Harry herself had stormed off to weeks earlier?

Now, Harry wouldn't say she knew Tom Riddle particularly well (even if she did ruin his evil schemes more than your average person) but she did have this nagging suspicion that he was absolutely sitting his ass down on a log in the middle of the night and staring moodily out towards the lake.

And Harry had really good instincts for this sort of thing.

Well, she might not have an invisibility cloak, but she was pretty good at ducking prefects and professors, so slowly but surely Harry weaved her way through the castle and out onto the grounds. It was pitch black out, the grounds only lit by a smattering of stars and a pale sliver of moon. The bare trees rustled in the wind and there was that soft earthy smell that came with the edge of Fall bleeding into Winter.

As she stepped closer to the lake, squinting, she could make out a silhouette of a boy who was tall enough to be a man.

She couldn't help but smile, almost fondly, at the sight of him sitting where she had been not so long ago.

She hadn't realized that the tables could ever turn, especially not for a pair like them.

* * *

"So, funny meeting you here in a place like this."

If ever there was a voice he did not want to hear in any moment ever again, it was this one.

Tom did not move, had not moved since he had come here, had instead sat ramrod straight, staring out towards the lake and wondering what would become of him. He had just destroyed himself—no, he had already been destroying himself inch by inch but had merely written it off, and now he found that he simply could not do it any longer.

What did it matter? What did anything in Tom Riddle's life matter? He was nothing but a poor attempt at a farce anyway. He'd be forgotten soon enough anyway, by his own volition no less. Except what would Voldemort be then? He'd be worse, really. At least Tom Riddle had a history of sorts, even if it was that of a poor orphan.

Voldemort was nothing more than paper-mâché.

She sat down next to him with a quiet thump and a too-loud exhalation. There was nothing graceful in the moment, nothing refined or feminine about the way she just plopped herself down next to him. It would have irritated him, not so long ago. Now he simply couldn't find the energy.

"It's a nice night," she said with a kind of fondness she didn't deserve, a small contented smile, "Cold as hell, but you know, for Halloween it's not too shabby. Usually, in my life anyway, everything goes to hell on Halloween at the level of trolls rampaging through the dungeons. This though, this isn't so bad."

"What do you want?" he asked instead, unable to help the bitterness in his own voice.

"If you haven't noticed," she said, finally turning to look directly at him, "I have this saving people thing."

"A what?" he asked, unable to help but turn to look at her as well with incredulously raised eyebrows. She didn't seem to mind, for once, instead just grinned back at him as if she'd thought more or less the same thing herself.

It was an oddly unguarded and free expression, the kind of look he'd thought he'd never get from her, had distantly longed for in odd moments here and there but never truly expected to see on her face. Yet it didn't fade; even as he blinked and felt his own expression dripping away from him, she just kept smiling as if she had no reason in the world not to.

"A saving people thing," Harry repeated as if it was the most normal phrase in the world, "I kind of charge without thinking into battle whenever I think somebody needs it. Or, in this case, I follow you out of the castle and try to find a way to cheer you up even when it isn't really my problem."

"Not your problem," Tom hissed at her, but her grin just grew, as if she'd been hoping he'd go and say that.

It wasn't, truly, her problem. Oh, but he wanted it to be. He wanted to rage at her for turning his world on its head in a matter of months. Not simply for opening the Chamber of Secrets without him, for performing sacrilege in a sanctified place, but for the fact that she had the presumption to stand tall and firm in the face of all opposition. Tom had bent like a reed in the wind because he had been convinced, had known, from the moment he set foot in this place, that it was the only way he would make it in this world.

Harry had dared to instead be a mountain, firm in the course of all howling winds, and he was the one who had crumbled at her feet.

And she didn't even have the decency to realize what she was.

"Nope," she said, before adding with a careless shrug, "Riddle, I barely understand you. How the hell is it my problem what goes on in your pretty little head?"

"This is not making me feel better," he said, before narrowing his eyes and focusing on that last part of her question, "And did you just call me pretty?"

She stared, her eyes growing as wide as saucers, and a light flush dusted her cheeks. "Well, I'm not blind, Riddle."

Tom had nothing to say to that.

Really, what could one say to that?

He wasn't blind either; he knew what he looked like. Although Tom had been born into poverty in muggle London, he had always been attractive, ambitious, and oh so intelligent. He had made use of each of these traits in their turn until he had fashioned himself into more than the wizarding world could ever expect from the likes of him.

Still, for one reason or another he had never expected to hear Harry Evans say it.

Then again, he'd never expect any of this night to have happened.

He had been so careful, so polished, for so many years now. And he'd been so close to graduation, only two more years of this, two more years of enduring Slughorn and the rest of the Slytherins. In the face of the rest of his life, in the face of Voldemort and all his ambitions, what was something like that?

Tonight, it had been enough. So that even now, sitting here, he found that he never wanted to go back inside that place.

He was done. For better or worse, he was done, finished. Whatever Tom Riddle returned to Hogwarts would not be the same Tom Riddle who had walked out here tonight. Even if his dormmates didn't cast him off for this, for his daring to look down upon them rather than vice versa, he simply could not return.

It was over.

He was finished.

"So, you lost your shit in front of all your cool friends," Harry said, her voice breaking into his thoughts with an ease she should not possess, "It happens."

"It happens?" he parroted dully, because it certainly never happened to Tom Riddle. Not even in the orphanage, not even with Dumbledore in that disastrous first meeting, had anything like this happened.

"It happens to me all the bloody time," Harry said, and then continued as if she was the expert at 'losing her shit in front of all her cool friends', "My fif—last year, I'd have these frequent epileptic seizures of doom in front of the whole school all the time. And they were death seizures, there was the shaking, the screaming, my eyes would apparently roll back into my head so you just saw the whites of them, my sca—well, point being, they were really bloody dramatic."

"I don't see what this—"

Harry cut him off before he had a chance to continue, "And this was while the Proph—Um, some really rude people, were spreading rumors about me all the time and how I was this fame-seeking narcissistic compulsive liar. And I'm not going to lie, it sucked, especially since we had this really vindictive professor who—"

"I thought you were homeschooled," Tom cut in.

She stopped, paled, swallowed, then said hoarsely, "Well, me and a couple of other village kids who were also homeschooled had these traveling professors come sometimes."

"Were you a part of a cult?" Tom asked, "Are you from Ireland or Wales?"

"Huh?"

He just felt his eyebrows rising higher, wondering if she really was this stupid or if she somehow thought he was this stupid, "Do you really expect me to believe that a group of magical children, who are not the children of those few sparse druid communities left, were kept from attending Hogwarts?"

"…We called it the golden trio," she said after a very healthy pause, then, flushing brilliantly red even in the dark, she asked, "Are you going to let me finish my story or not?!"

"Did your story have a point?" Tom asked in turn, sarcasm oozing from his tone.

"Yes, it did! A very good point, too!"

"Really? Because it wasn't getting there very quickly," Tom pointed out, unable to help his lips twisting into a sly smile, "I was starting to lose interest."

"Well, that's not my bloody problem, is it?!" she asked, crossing her arms with a humph and clearly wondering why she'd ever bothered to come out here in the first place.

"Certainly not," Tom responded, "You, after all, are hardly responsible for what goes on in my pretty head."

"Damn straight," she agreed, then fell into restless silence, tapping her foot and staring moodily out at the lake while he just continued to smile.

Lord, but he did feel better, didn't he? All it'd taken was her coming down here, after him and not Alphard Black, and it'd been as if one less thing was resting on his shoulders. It wasn't as if anything had changed for the better, it was still as dismal and hopeless and ever, but she was here.

And somehow, that meant more than she would ever know.

"Can I finish?" she asked, pouting over at him, glaring like she was onto whatever evil distracting scheme he'd hatched this time.

"I'm not going to stop you."

"You know, I really dislike you."

"But you don't hate me," he pointed out, and for some reason this gave her pause. She actually considered his words and seemed to look past whatever image she constantly projected onto him.

"No," she said finally, softly, as if she could hardly believe it herself, "I don't hate you."

For a moment they just stared at one another. It was pitch black out, so even sitting right next to her he could barely make out her features, could hardly catch the glow of her unnaturally green eyes. Still, they both stared quietly, as if just by looking they could find whatever it was they were looking for in one another.

"You said something about a particularly vindictive professor of your cult?" he asked.

"Right," Harry said, nodding shortly, "She was there too, and she really was the worst, I mean look at what she did to my hand! And this one's apparently going to be stuck there forever!"

She held up her right hand under his nose so that he had to lean back slightly to see what the hell she was talking about. There, squinting, he realized were words etched into the back of her hand in what looked like it could be her hand writing.

"I must not tell lies."

"Jesus," he breathed out, because who, how, how would something like that get onto the back of her hand? He didn't believe her professor story for a moment, except that Harry was an abysmal liar, but all the same how had words been carved into her skin?

She pulled her hand back before he could touch it, suddenly self-conscious, perhaps realizing that she'd shown him more than she should have. She gave him that awkward smile, the one she used to brush off that which was truly terrible, and said, "That's not really important. The important thing was that it did suck, and everyone did treat me like garbage for the most part, except they also forgot about it."

She looked at him pointedly, "People have their own shit to deal with, their own lives and problems. At the end of things, they don't really have the time or interest to spend caring about yours. Give it time, some large distracting event, and it will be like this one little blip never happened at all and you'll be Hogwarts's personal prince charming again."

She seemed so confident, likely looking for her rainbow connection as always, and when she smiled at him he almost felt confident and hopeful in turn. He didn't think she was wrong; if he chose to he could turn this around in time.

And yet. "What if I don't want to be that anymore?"

"What?" Her jaw fell open and she looked like he'd just slapped her across the face with a herring.

"But that's—" she cut herself off, floundered, hands flying everywhere in gesture as she searched for her words, "I mean—Riddle, that's what you've always wanted."

"You haven't known me very long, Harry," he said with a fondness he no longer had the energy to deny himself, "What do you know about what I do and don't want?"

Her mouth opened, closed, and she did a marvelous impression of a drowning cod fish. Finally, she spluttered out, "I thought I knew a whole bloody lot. I mean, if that lot doesn't like you won't it make it harder for your evil schemes of world domination?"

He laughed. He couldn't help it, he tilted his head back and laughed long and hard while she just stared, blushed, fidgeted, and looked dreadfully uncomfortable. She looked like she wanted to be anywhere else in the world but here, but like she just couldn't bring herself to leave.

Because Tom was a soul in need.

He laughed harder.

"Are you done yet?"

"No," he said through chuckles, wiping tears of laughter from his eyes, "Not hardly."

"Well," she said with an offended huff, "I'm glad I amuse you, Mr. Riddle."

"Harry," he said looking at her with a smile, "I do believe you have no idea what you do to me."

She stared at him, blinked, her eyes narrowed in suspicion and she said, "Never say that to me ever, and I mean ever, again."

"I'm having an existential crisis," he said, standing from his log and making his way back to the castle, "I can do whatever the bloody hell I feel like."

"After all," he said as he waited for her to scramble to his feet and charge after him, "Last time we were in this position, you decided it'd be a wonderful idea to open the Chamber of Secrets."

"That's— I— You—You are a bastard!" she started, but he was already walking away, smiling to himself as he did so, and thought that at least this much was right with the world.

* * *

 **Author's Note: Ah, so many feels. And thank you to GlassGirlCeci for betaing the chapter. Otherwise new in the world of "When Harry Met Tom" is "All our Grand Ambitions" where we get a glimpse of a hypothetical future Tom and Harry.**

 **Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.**


	13. Chapter 13

_"Why are you getting so upset? This is not about you."_

-When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _November, 1942_

* * *

The end of term was approaching surprisingly quickly.

Then again, she would never say that first term had ever been slow; usually a lot of stuff managed to happen in first term. Her first year, with all the new experiences, this strange and magical thing called friendship, and trolls in the dungeon—it had damn well near flown by.

Still, considering how September had crawled in 1942, she would have expected the rest of it to crawl. Somehow though, between Tom Riddle and even more Tom Riddle, it was already the end of November with their Defense project due and all the other first term finals happening a week later.

Then it was off on the Hogwarts Express and leaving Hogwarts for Christmas for the first time.

And she knew that it wasn't going to be like the Dursleys, where Christmas was this strange, heart-wrenching concept of all the things Harry ever wanted and all the things she'd never get to have, but still…

She'd never had a good Christmas outside of Hogwarts.

And she knew that she was in 1942, that even if she did stay in the castle she'd be stuck with Tom Riddle (who apparently spent every bloody holiday in Hogwarts), but that didn't mean she still didn't feel that heartsick hollowness at the idea of Ron and Hermione and everyone else having Christmas somewhere outside of her reach.

Well, if she had left them in any condition to celebrate Christmas at all.

But that was all the garbage Harry tried not to think about. She'd never forget it, of course, and that was why she was so desperately trying to get home. That was another terrifying bit, actually, the fact that sometimes Harry had to remind herself.

It was easy, when you were a complete social leper, to remember you didn't belong here and that you had to go back. Sure, Harry wasn't exactly liked now, but there was… There was more of a place for her now, somehow between Riddle and Alphard, and it got a little too comfortable at times.

Harry would think about her grades in various classes, more than just as a means to stay in Hogwarts and prepare for the worst, but really thinking about them, as if Harry really was going to graduate in 1945 with the rest of them.

But what Harry really caught herself distracted by was that Tom Marvolo Riddle had officially gone off the deep end.

Oh, she'd known it—she'd seen it in action as well as its brooding aftermath by the lake.

But she really had thought he'd get over it. That the next morning he'd pull himself up by the bootstraps and everything would be back to normal. Maybe, if he was still in his weird depressed funk, he'd be in some kind of weird brooding depressed funk where he glared at walls all the time and looked like a miserable puppy.

He didn't do any of that.

Oh no, the next morning had Tom Riddle walking in looking like he'd been run over by a freight train and liked it that way. His normally artfully curled hair had been sticking up in several directions to rival Harry's shorter childhood haircuts, with his tie wrinkled, his clothes wrinkled.

And instead of sitting down in his position as king of the Slytherins, he walked right past them (with the lot of them alternating between glaring or else looking at him like he'd gone mad) and instead sat down in Harry's isolated bubble of loserdom at the very edge of the Slytherin table.

And at Harry's look of astonishment and horror, all he did was raise a dark, delicate eyebrow, stuff a piece of toast in his mouth, and ask her, "What are you looking at, Evans?"

Tom had embraced his status as a complete and utter loser with an enthusiasm only matched by his evil older counterpart's enthusiasm for murdering Harry Potter.

Not just for a day either, oh no, for weeks now.

Harry was now officially weirded out.

Not just weirded out, either, but maybe a tad… concerned.

At the moment, she was frantically reading through every book she could in the Hogwarts library on the fair folk. Writing down some guidelines and tips for her Christmas vacation down under. Among them was, "no eating food, ever" and "avoid revelry whenever possible". But even when it was looking like maybe this was a dangerous and stupid idea even for Harry, whatever the rewards, she just kept finding herself very distracted by Riddle.

He had… changed. She wasn't sure it was a bad change. She wasn't sure if it was good, either, but it was a change. Tom Riddle in the diary had not been forthright with her in any sense, had done everything he could to be polite and charming. More seriously, he had unleashed a basilisk in the school, while this Tom Riddle no longer could even if he wanted to.

And Harry was no longer sure that this Tom Riddle even wanted to.

Somehow, it was this second part that felt more damning than even the lack of opportunity.

As if, by changing Tom Riddle, Harry had changed something far more fundamental to the timeline. Harry's timeline she could picture surviving without a basilisk; she could not picture her life without Voldemort being what he was.

Harry slammed her book shut, looked up at her studious companion, and decided there was nothing for it. "This is clearly getting out of control."

Alphard looked up. It wasn't one of their study dates, but in the past few weeks, Alphard had often found himself at her table in the library. Harry wasn't sure why, she was sure he had better things to do, but he did it nonetheless.

Part of it might just be to annoy Riddle, or else graciously save Harry from his attention, as whenever Alphard wasn't around, usually Riddle would plop down at her library table with his new take it or leave it attitude and a barrelful of witty acerbic comments about how smart Harry wasn't.

Now, Harry didn't know why Alphard was enough to drive Riddle off, but she was grateful for it.

Especially when she was about to start gossiping about the man in question.

"What's out of control?" Alphard asked, looking up from his own Transfiguration book, which Harry honestly couldn't tell if he was reading because he was a bloody overachiever or because he actually enjoyed that sort of thing.

"Riddle," Harry hissed, eyes darting around as if she could catch him loitering in the shadows eavesdropping, "I'm losing my bloody mind, Alphard."

"Riddle," Alphard said with a resigned sigh, rubbing at the bridge of his nose, "Harry, you must believe I don't give a damn about Riddle."

"I know you don't," Harry said, wondering why he thought that she thought he cared, "But you have to admit that it's getting weird—and this is important, Alphard! I know it might not look like it, but the state of that man's mind is very important!"

"The world does not revolve around Riddle," Alphard said patiently, "And thanks to his own actions, neither does this school. Now, Harry, do remember we are in a library."

"Then put that quiet ward thing up!" Harry hissed out under her breath, eyes now darting around for both Riddle and the librarian.

"Must we, Harry?"

"Yes, we must!"

He sighed, closed his book, and with a rather defeated look flicked and swished his wand to set up a silent barrier around them. Harry breathed out a sigh of relief and returned gratefully to her normal speaking volume.

"So, Riddle has completely lost it. What do we do?" Harry asked, throwing her hands in the air and waiting for Alphard to come up with something.

"We don't do anything," Alphard said slowly, "Riddle's spectacular fall from grace is not our concern."

"No, wrong type of thinking," Harry said, "The future could very well depend on Riddle's spectacular fall from grace or whatever."

"Clearly," Alphard said drily, clearly not believing Harry at all. Which, Harry could hardly blame him, she was sure she sounded crazy, but it was the bloody truth! Harry couldn't help it if they lived in a universe that hinged on Tom Riddle. She'd actually prefer they didn't live in that universe, but they did, and Harry had to make the best of it.

Well, if this was the best of it.

Maybe it was better for the world that Tom became a friendless hermit. He wouldn't have followers then, after all. He'd just be crazy by himself and then Harry's parents wouldn't have died and—

And Harry would be stuck here, because that certainly would not be her world anymore.

Even if things had changed, she could not guarantee that she had truly changed him, and Harry had to weigh the scales against what she could be sure of. The future was waiting for her, the past would move on without her, and that was the way that it was.

"We need to make him king of Slytherin again," Harry said forcefully, forcing doubt from her mind and letting Riddle have the future he was meant to. Not the basilisk, never the basilisk, but once he was outside of this school, his life was whatever he made of it.

Harry was not responsible for his failures.

Alphard laughed and shook his head. "Not going to happen."

"Why not?"

"I'm serious, my cousins will never let that performance of his go," Alphard said, "And he knows it too. He will never be what he was, even if he wanted to."

Alphard flipped back open his book, as if he was now certain they were finished. "Oh, and don't even get me started on Slughorn. The man might forgive him, if only for his own pride, but he's not going to go out of his way to do favors for Riddle either. Tom has just destroyed any chance of entering the Ministry of Magic, I can tell you that much."

"I think you're wrong," Harry said, slamming her hand down on his book and forcing him to look at her.

"Oh?"

"You're underestimating him. If he wanted to do it, he could," Harry said, wondering distantly when she'd found so much faith in Tom Riddle. Still, this had always been true; she would never doubt he was capable of something like this.

"He doesn't want to do it, though," Alphard said in astonishment, "That's your whole trouble, Harry. I think for the first time in his life he's actually doing what he wants. It just turns out that he wanted to be an asshole."

Harry couldn't help it, she let out a snicker, and had to force herself to remember this was a very serious moment. "Well, then, you're also overestimating everyone else."

"Oh, I doubt that," Alphard said, because Harry had gotten the idea that Alphard, despite his kind nature, was a bit of a cynic when it came to his peers. He liked Harry, for whatever reason, but Harry still really didn't know what that reason was, except that she maybe entertained him.

As it was, Alphard was polite, respected, but in his own way a less malign Riddle. Just as Riddle had had many peers, associates, but no friends, Alphard Black seemed to have no true friends. Just Harry.

"They will forget this, Alphard," Harry said, "You give them something, anything, distracting enough, and they will forget all about him. In fact, if he times it right, he can slide right back into the fold like he never left."

"My cousins are many things," Alphard said slowly, "But they are not all stupid, Harry."

"You're wrong," Harry said, shaking her head, "I'm sorry, but I know it, it just has to be distracting enough."

"And what could possibly be that distracting?"

Well…

Harry had never had to provide her own distraction before. Usually, Hogwarts was kind enough to throw it at her.

The Chamber of Secrets had been very distracting, as had the Parseltongue disaster, and then Harry's heroic saving of Ginny Weasley. The next year, of course, they'd forgotten all about it when Sirius had made his cameo as an 80's slasher villain. And then they'd forgotten all about that when the Triwizard Tournament came along.

Point being, if it was big enough, no one would remember Riddle's little hiccup at the Slug Club.

But Hogwarts in 1942 wasn't going to provide, especially since Harry had miraculously nipped the basilisk in the bud, which meant whatever was distracting enough was on Harry and Harry alone.

And then she had it, just like that.

"Alphard," Harry breathed in wonder at her surprising moment of pure genius, "Do you think you can do me a favor?"

* * *

Tom was really starting to see why Harry Evans was so insistent about being Harry Evans.

There was a certain exhilarating freedom, an inherent appeal, in living in a world with no expectations. True, all the doors to the noble houses had been slammed in his face, but those had been slammed shut to begin with, if Tom was feeling honest.

Which, for years he had never had the slightest whim to feel honest either with himself, or others. Now though, he didn't know why he had avoided it for so very long.

He could say whatever he liked, whatever he was thinking, and do whatever he wanted.

If he wanted to scream at Myrtle Warren to get her pale ass out of the bloody lavatory already or he was going to lose his mind, he could. If he wanted to tell McGonagall in Transfiguration that he'd never liked Quidditch, never understood it, and thought that the seeker position was invented so that the king's retarded son could catch the shiny bauble and automatically win the game, he could say that too. If he wanted to tell Abraxas Malfoy to go take that scented hair gel that had to be made of magical caviar for how expensive it was and shove it up his ass, Tom could bloody well do that too.

It was a brave new world, and he marveled at how long he'd been avoiding it.

True, he still studied like mad, still performed his prefect duties to the best of his ability, and despite himself he had gone to Slughorn and claimed having a mental breakdown in the Slug Club and won't the man please forgive him but Harry Evans had driven him temporarily mad. To Tom's infinite regret, he still needed Slughorn.

Still, good bloody riddance to the rest of it.

This was why the last Saturday in November found him rather alarmed and concerned.

Or, more importantly, why Harry's declaration that very morning had him alarmed and concerned.

She'd appeared out of nowhere in the common room that morning, grinning from ear to ear as she looked down to where he'd lazily been lounging on the couch and appreciating his new life. Normally on a Saturday he was all over the place doing whatever the bloody hell Abraxas or the Blacks wanted, which was always unbearably dull.

Not to mention that for once in his life he really didn't have to go to the Quidditch match. In any other circumstance it'd be unthinkable, given it was Slytherin vs. Ravenclaw and the last game of the year. Now, though, no one was expecting him to show up, and it was delightful.

That was, until Harry Evans looked down at him with those unnaturally green eyes, and said, "Riddle, I have a plan!"

"A what?" Tom asked, very confused as to both why she was here and what she was talking about. One thing that hadn't changed in the ensuing weeks after Halloween was that Harry, in general, preferred not to be in his vicinity.

The difference was that now he didn't have to jump through hoops to find an excuse to hunt her down, he could just do it.

The only trouble was that Alphard Black had either taken it upon himself to be her knight in shining armor or else her sad little tutor who met with her even when he didn't have to. Well, Tom could tell him one thing: books were probably the last path to Evans' heart.

Point being, Harry Evans had yet to, other than that Halloween night, approach him of her own free will.

She sat down next to him on the couch, hands flying everywhere as she excitedly explained, "I have a plan that will make everyone forget Halloween ever happened!"

Tom didn't want to go back to that.

He had a sudden, sinking feeling of dread that she'd succeed, and he'd be back where he started, clawing at the walls of his own soul while falling into a great crevasse. He'd stood, but she'd already been standing up, practically skipping her way to the door, saying over her shoulder, "Quidditch game today. Be there, Riddle."

And so, Tom had had no choice but to be there, sitting by himself in the stands, in the cold, praying to god that Harry Evans did not do what she usually managed to do. He would normally say it was impossible, especially since Tom himself didn't want it, but this was Harry Evans.

He'd come to realize that there simply was no predicting what that girl was capable of.

A creak, and Tom looked up almost expecting to see Harry, but blanched as he instead found a resigned and irritated looking Alphard Black looking down at him.

"Black," Tom said in greeting.

"Riddle," Alphard said as, with a sigh, he sat down next to him.

For a moment they said nothing, both watching the stands fill up with spectators divided into blue, green, and a smattering of other colors for the true Quidditch enthusiasts. Which, usually, Alphard wasn't one, but being a Ravenclaw prefect he was almost as obligated to be here as Tom himself was.

It was amazing anyone was here at all, given how bloody cold and miserable it was out. God forbid Quidditch ever be unwatched or canceled, though. Glancing at the sky, Tom couldn't help but note that it even looked like rain. Lovely.

Finally, Tom couldn't help but note, "I suppose you wouldn't happen to know why I'm here."

Alphard, apparently, could only sigh at that. "Unfortunately, I do."

A long silence after that, where they waited in the miserable cold for the teams to appear from the locker rooms already, and finally Tom pressed, "And?"

Black sighed again, lacing his fingers together, and said, "Harry Evans has decided to sub in for Ravenclaw's pitiful seeker. My team is so pathetic this year, and I'm respected enough, that they have decided to give it a try. Not to mention it's the last game of the season so why not go out with some sort of bang."

"What?" Tom asked, but Alphard just nodded.

"Harry said it would be… enough to distract the school from your current state of affairs."

Tom blinked, couldn't help but let his mouth fall open, and then blurted, "But it's Quidditch!"

"Believe me," Black said, "I know."

Well, this would never work. Tom breathed out a sigh of relief. Nothing would change, no matter how infatuated with this sport the entire bloody school was. Well, thank god; Tom was getting quite used to his new state of affairs.

Plus, Slytherin was quite good this year, slated to win by a landslide. Ravenclaw would lose like everyone was expecting and they'd be back to the dorms in time for tea.

Finally the teams came out, the all-male and incredibly wealthy Slytherin team, and the less well-funded mix-gendered Ravenclaw with—

"Oh my god, she really is down there."

He could pick her out even from up in the stands, her hair pulled back but still flying in every direction possible, wearing a rather ragged substitute uniform, and holding what looked like the brooms they used during first year flying lessons.

"Yes," Alphard said, as if he wished he could roll on the ground in embarrassment, "She really is."

Tom supposed that was why Alphard was sitting next to him, because even if Alphard didn't seem to like him (and the feeling was very mutual), at least Tom would understand precisely what this felt like.

He couldn't believe she had managed this.

"Is she allowed to do this?"

"According to our captain," Alphard responded, "Although it looks like they're working that out right about now."

The Slytherin captain stormed up to the referee as well as the Ravenclaw captain. There was much bickering and motioning towards Harry, and then a clear moment where it seemed to be written off as a waste of everyone's time.

Likely figuring that Harry was about to embarrass both herself and the entire Ravenclaw team.

No doubt the worried murmuring in Ravenclaw was about that, but there was also a trill of hope, a thought that perhaps with this new seeker this was a game Ravenclaw might win.

Tom was praying to God that it wasn't.

With that they were off, both teams mounting and floating up towards the goals, where the initial part of the game would commence and the seekers would lie in wait and search for the snitch.

She looked very focused up there, as she had the few times she confronted Tom with the intent to duel, as if everything but the Quidditch pitch had melted away from her. She flew in lazy, circular motions, giving no indication of having found the snitch or even truly looking for it, just keeping out of the way of the Slytherin beaters.

Tom looked across the field to where the Slytherin seeker was mirroring her actions, staring at her intently even as he looked for the snitch, looking for any indication of how well Harry Evans could play this game.

However, as a homeschooled mudblood, she should not have been this good on a broom at all.

Tom found himself leaning forward, for the first time in his life intent upon this idiotic game, his eyes glued on her and the ease with which she flew. This was not what Tom Riddle had looked like in his flight classes.

Oh, he'd gotten off the ground right away with the others, but that had not prepared him for the sense of vertigo and terror on reaching heights men simply were not meant to.

Harry Evans looked as if she had been born up there.

Harry Evans was not muggleborn.

It felt like something he'd known a long time ago, perhaps in the very beginning, but needed some image such as Harry on a broom to solidify.

She was not muggleborn, she had not been homeschooled by a stray magical cousin, she had more than likely attended a magical academy somewhere and she had been lying to each and every one of them for months.

Only believed because what else could Harry Evans possibly be, looking and acting the way she did? More, believed because no one gave the time of day to an impoverished mudblood, and she had used that to her every advantage.

Ravenclaw scored the pitiful amount needed for a seeker's victory to count and immediately Harry dove.

Not just dove; that wasn't the word for it. At a straight ninety-degree angle she raced headlong into death with the Slytherin seeker fast on her heels. The ground grew dangerously closer, and Tom found himself standing along with half the crowd. The Slytherin seeker pulled up and out of the dive, rolling out of the way while Harry kept going, reaching out with a single pale hand.

Just before she hit the ground, she caught it, rolling to the side with her hair brushing against the earth as she raised her hand, and the snitch on high.

Having caught it in nearly record time.

The stands were silent, even as the match was called. The teams still floated in the air, open mouthed, the beaters barely holding onto their bats. Then the Ravenclaw team as well as the spectators stood and cheered loudly and wildly, throwing scarves into the air and setting off confetti from wand point.

The Slytherins then cursed, the team flying to the ground, the captain moving to the referee and likely demanding a rematch or a forfeit for allowing Harry Evans as seeker, but it had already been decided; everyone knew that against all expectations, Ravenclaw had won.

No, Harry Evans had won.

"Well," Alphard said quietly, slowly, "I'll be damned."

"No," Tom said slowly, "I am the one who's damned."

He watched as Harry flew to the ground and dismounted in a single graceful effort, letting the tamed snitch fly out of her hand. On her face was the most victorious, most triumphant of smiles as the Ravenclaw team hoisted her into the air and on their shoulders.

Why was it that even when his life had already turned on its head, Harry felt the need to go and flip it upside down once again?

It was as if, he thought with the strangest of smiles growing on his lips, she always felt the need to make sure Tom Riddle was off-kilter.

* * *

 **Author's Note: Oh Tom, clearly you will never win. Brought to you early by the 900th review of "When Harry Met Tom" by pucflek who asked for another chapter. A large thank you to GlassGirlCeci for betaing the chapter in record time.**

 **Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	14. Chapter 14

_"I miss her."_

 _"I don't miss him. I really don't."_

 _"Not even a little?"_

 _"You know what I miss? I miss the idea of him."_

 _"Maybe I only miss the idea of Helen… No, I miss the whole Helen."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _December, 1942_

* * *

Harry didn't understand it.

It wasn't that nothing had changed; things had changed in the few weeks remaining, but it hadn't changed enough or in the right direction. Suddenly, people were talking to and about Harry, and Slughorn had called her into his office to ask her when she'd started Seeking and if she'd always been so very good at it. More to the point, why she hadn't tried out for the Slytherin team or told anyone.

"My dear girl," he'd said jovially as he smiled across at her, "It does no one good to hide your talents out of humility."

Harry hadn't known quite what to say to that.

Slytherin hated her more than ever. Before, she was just embarrassing, oh, but now she was a threat. There was the lingering truth in the air that if they could put aside their pride, then Harry could single-handedly lead them to the Quidditch Cup for the next three years. That, perhaps, if their tryouts had not been so masculinity-dominated, if they hadn't sneered at her for her pedigree and lack of money, they could have won.

As it was, Harry was somehow unofficially a member of the Ravenclaw Quidditch team, with the captain begging her to come back next semester, and she'd work it out with the referee and Slughorn. She was brought to their table along with Alphard, cheered as an unofficial member, and felt all in all like she was back in Hogwarts again in those periods when suddenly everyone in the world was acting like her friend.

Meanwhile, Slughorn made promises to talk to the Slytherin captain to get Harry a permanent position with her own House as Seeker, and tried to pressure her into committing to trying out next year.

"Nepotism, you know," Slughorn said, looking away from her for a moment pensively, "Truly does only get one so far; not all apples fall close to the tree, so to speak. As fond as I am of my students, I fear that they sometimes forget that there are diamonds in the rough."

Harry hadn't known what to say to that either.

The trouble was, not everything changed. The thing that Harry had intended to change, the reason she had so willingly sacrificed her spot out of the limelight, had not.

Tom Riddle remained the same as before. No, perhaps he was even more hated by the Slytherins than he had ever been. Wherever his marble pedestal was, he was falling far and fast from the very sight of it, and soon he'd hit rock bottom with the likes of Harry Evans.

Alphard had told her while they were studying for their end of term exams in the library, "Of course they're upset, Harry. To them it is betrayal and humiliation."

He looked up from his book, his silver eyes kind but chiding. "I told you that it wouldn't work."

"Humiliation?" Harry asked, leaning towards him over her own haphazard and dismal notes. Alphard, unfortunately, was not like Hermione, in that while he no doubt kept as notes as good or better than hers, he found no great joy in sharing them directly with Harry.

Harry hadn't realized it before, but for all Hermione always lectured Harry and Ron for not studying, she would also do more than help them with their homework and study for exams. Alphard wasn't like that; he'd never directly answer her questions. Instead, he'd ask her questions and force her to parrot back what she'd actually learned, and if she didn't know, he'd tell her to hit the books again and think.

"True magic, Harry, is not simply the clever regurgitation of spells with the right pronunciation," Alphard had said at one point after Harry had threatened to throw a book at his head, asking him why he even bothered tutoring her if he wasn't going to tell her the answers. "There are layers and layers of mathematics and principles underlying every spell we use. And if you do not understand that, the art of magic, then you do not understand it at all."

Hermione, on the other hand, enjoyed showing what she herself had learned to Ron and Harry, as well as lecturing them. Harry loved her, but Hermione had such an ego sometimes, and Harry wouldn't deny that she'd used it to her advantage. Namely, she'd always put off studying until the end of term because chances were good Hermione would tell her exactly what she needed to know to pass the exams.

Alphard would not.

So, for the first time in her Hogwarts career, she really was stuck with her own pitiful collection of notes for each class. May the god of the wizards have mercy on her dimwitted soul and give her a passing grade in Potions.

She shook away the thoughts as Alphard nodded at her question, as if of course humiliation was involved. "Why are they thinking that? Riddle had nothing to do with it."

As Alphard and Riddle both very well knew, and commented as often as they could, it had all been Harry's brilliant scheme.

"Well, they don't know that," Alphard said drily, returning to his book and flipping a page. "Remember what they think of you; to them, you are even less than a pawn. You are… an aberration the likes of which we mortals have never seen before."

Harry asked the only thing she could possibly ask to that sort of question: "What?"

Alphard sighed and gave her a rather flat look, as if she was being purposefully dense. "They think he knew beforehand and set you up to it. They think that his mental breakdown in the Slug Club was a calculated move, whose only possible explanation is the utter embarrassment of the heirs of the great noble and ancient houses of Britain. They think your stint as Ravenclaw Seeker was his way of rubbing their faces in the dirt and proving to them that a talentless muggleborn hack of a woman could effortlessly rip the rug out from under them and steal their beloved sport."

"What?" Harry repeated, feeling, if possible, even dumber than before.

How the hell had she gotten sorted into Slytherin again? More, how had Alphard avoided it?

"In short, they believe you're Riddle's agent."

"His agent," Harry barked out with a laugh. "They think I'm working for Riddle? Playing Quidditch for the likes of Riddle?"

"You are, in a sense," Alphard mused. "You did it for his benefit, though not his enjoyment."

"Yeah, but, that's because—" Harry cut herself off, because she didn't know how to explain without blurting out the truth of it. Even then, how did she explain that she was handing Riddle all the advantages he'd need to become something truly monstrous and terrifying? She couldn't even always explain it to herself. Sometimes she was relieved that Tom Riddle was still a loser, because at least she had tried and failed versus tried, succeeded, and lived with the knowledge that she had condemned the wizarding world to his war.

"Well, it's just because," Harry finished lamely, ignoring Alphard's dubiously raised eyebrows and small nod as if to say 'whatever you say, Harry'. "You don't have to believe me, and I don't have to explain myself—"

"You never do," Alphard interjected.

"—But it is important."

Alphard stared at her for a moment, thinking deeply, a small, odd frown on his face, and finally he asked, "Do you like him?"

Harry almost died. It felt as if someone had taken electric cords to her heart and zapped it, leaving her coughing and spluttering as she missed her breath and her heart skipped a beat. "What?"

"It's alright to like him, Harry," he said, but his expression was very subtle and Harry couldn't get a read on it. "Many do—did, rather."

Finally, in a smaller, somehow sadder voice, he said, "He is very handsome."

Harry finally regained her breath. "No! No—no—nope, not a—no. Just—no. Never, even, not even if he was the last man on Earth. Not even if he and Snape were the last men on Earth and a gun was pointed at my head as someone said, 'Well, Harry, for the good of the human race it's one or the other.'"

Alphard started laughing, a hand to his mouth as if he was desperately trying to contain it but couldn't help himself. His face was turning red from the lack of oxygen, and small tears of mirth were gathering at the corners of his eyes.

"Hell wouldn't just freeze over," Harry continued, hands twisting together as she tried to imagine the hellish universe Alphard was describing. "They would call it the second ice age, and there would be woolly mammoths roaming about where once there'd been burning lakes of sulfur. It would—will—can never ever happen. God, just no."

Harry breathed in and out, even while Alphard finally lost it, dropping his hand and bursting out into full blown hysterics. The only thing, as usual, not getting them thrown out of the library being his wards.

"Well," he finally said with that fond smile that begged Harry to never change, "If you feel that strongly."

He stood, packed his things, and smiled down at her. "Ah, Harry, I shall miss you over the holidays. Make sure to write."

He hadn't missed her jerking, her sudden frown, at the thought that if everything went well, Harry would never again have the chance to write.

That was days ago now. The last week of classes were upon them, and Harry and Riddle were sitting in Defense waiting to put on the show that had started this whole mess. To imagine, if Harry had been sitting anywhere else in this room, none of this would have ever happened. She had been so close, so very close, to precious anonymity and hadn't even realized it until it was far too late.

Right now, they were watching Crabbe and Goyle's progenitors putting together what had to be the lamest Defense project Harry had ever seen. First off, it was a basic sort of jinx, the kind Harry had actually been taught by Quirrell (which was a miracle, as the man had made a point to teach them nothing useful) and mastered easily in her first year. Second, they were currently trying and failing to cast both it and the counter on each other.

Harry's Crabbe and Goyle were much the same, thick to an alarming degree, and she always wondered just why Malfoy had them as goons. Sure, they were large and intimidating, but that wasn't supposed to mean anything for a wizard. Wizards and witches were supposed to rely on their magical prowess; punching your enemies in the face was viewed as very muggle, so what good were Crabbe and Goyle supposed to be?

Then again, this was Harry talking about Malfoy, who was comprised of a lineage of ferrets and weasels. She was giving him entirely too much credit.

Something tapped on her desk. Harry glanced down, then glanced again and had to blink once or twice. She looked across at her desk partner, who gave her his patented 'don't be cheeky' look back.

Tom Riddle had just passed her a note.

"What?" Harry mouthed to him, and his unamused look somehow became even more unamused.

He tapped the note again with a quill, eyebrows raising pointedly, wordlessly telling her to read it already.

Harry's eyes dropped to it, and oof, his penmanship. Each time she saw those perfect loops it was like another dagger through her heart. Harry had the penmanship with a quill of an eight-year-old with no fingers; she'd never gotten over the loss of ballpoint pens and pencils.

"What are you doing over the holidays?" it read.

Harry stared at it, stared at it some more, and continued to stare at it even as McGonagall and her Gryffindor partner made their way to the front of the class for the demonstration of their end of term project.

She looked back up at Tom, and he nodded, slowly and subtly, down towards the paper. Clearly telling her that he really did expect her to answer.

There were so many things she could say to that. First, when had the likes of Riddle ever slacked off in class? Second, just why?

"What's it to you?" Harry finally wrote down in her typical chicken scratch.

"I am staying in Hogwarts over the holidays," he wrote swiftly and gracefully, even his fingers looking elegant as he wrote on the parchment. "I wish to know if I will be bored."

Well, there was only one thing to say to that, and it was the first time in her life Harry was grateful to say it: "I'm not staying over the holidays."

He gave her a very pointed look, then, something intense that seemed to see through the very heart of her, as if Harry had just made a very grave mistake. After a very long pause, he quietly wrote on the paper again before passing it towards her, looking not at her but at McGonagall and what probably was Bones' great aunt or something.

"I thought you had no family."

Harry felt something cold go through her then. It was as if he'd written more than that, accused her of more than that. She'd mentioned the Dursleys, but she'd also mentioned friends, hadn't she? But in those artful letters Harry read something else: "I know you are lying to me."

"I'm not staying with my uncle," Harry wrote down swiftly, horridly, even as the Gryffindor pair received high praise from Merrythought. "You're right, I hate them and they hate me, and they're very happy to see the back of me. I'm visiting some friends, though, over the break, and I don't want to wait until summer."

He looked at her words critically, and again it was as if he saw straight through to the heart of them, as if they were only the barest pretense. "If you have these friends, Harry, then why did you come to Hogwarts?"

Harry opened her mouth to respond, to scramble and write down some excuse about how they didn't have room for her (they didn't, the Weasleys never had, they had enough mouths to feed and Harry understood that they couldn't take her in even if they wanted to, because she was sure that they wanted to, she had to be sure they wanted to) or how Harry had decided it was time to come to Hogwarts after all, but they were out of time.

"Riddle and Evans," Merrythought called out.

Harry felt as if the ground was disappearing beneath her feet, like she was walking on a crumbling bridge over a great crevasse, and any second now she'd plunge into darkness.

He suspected something, knew something. How much did he suspect and how much had he guessed? That she wasn't really a muggleborn, or at the very least was some strange mix of muggle raised with a wizard's inheritance behind her? Did he know worse than that, that Harry wasn't from this time and place at all but from a future where she knew him? What could he do if he had guessed or suspected? Did that mean he knew who she was fifty years from now, when even Harry didn't? Had he recognized her but never said anything, or acted on it in any way? Or did it mean that it was off track now? Had she done what she was afraid she would, what she had risked with the basilisk but thought could be contained? What would he do to her if he figured all of it out, that Harry was from the future, that she knew bloody everything or close enough to everything?

How was she supposed to cast a Patronus now?

No, she thought as she looked out to her peers, she had always cast a Patronus in situations like this. A Patronus was not born of the easy, simple times when everything fell together and felt purposeful. It was the hope that you would again reach those times, the utter faith and certainty that it waited somewhere for you, if you could find it.

It didn't matter what Tom Riddle did or didn't know, it didn't matter that he'd fallen off his pedestal, because he'd get back up soon enough on his own. Harry was leaving this island, and when she reached the Irish shores, she would find the fair folk and negotiate for herself a miracle.

So, Tom could keep his suspicions to himself, because Harry Evans would disappear from this place as if she'd never existed in the first place.

" _Expecto Patronum!_ "

* * *

"Harry, Harry, wait!" Tom rushed to the station, parting through the crowds to find her solemnly facing the train in that Hogwarts uniform, the one that Slughorn had loaned to her all those weeks ago after the Chamber.

He'd made a mistake, he'd moved too quickly in Defense, and whatever good feeling there had been between them had vanished with an impenetrable wall in its place. It was stupid, he'd gotten too curious, too impatient, and as he always did when he'd seen weakness, he'd moved forward to strike.

He'd never cared about the consequences before, he cared less about most of the consequences now, but he'd forgotten that for some reason he cared about consequences regarding her.

No one would call themselves Evans unless they had a reason to hide. No one would make themselves so purposefully unworthy of notice, even under the guise of being muggleborn, unless they wanted absolutely no one in the world looking for them.

And he'd gone and let her know that he knew, just to see what she'd do, when he should have seen it coming miles away.

It was that thought that had him making favors with Slughorn and sprinting to Hogsmeade's station as all the other students departed, part of the mob but returning on his own, escorted only by professors back to Hogwarts for the long, cold winter.

"Harry," he said, slowing down as he reached her, "Were you really not going to say goodbye?"

Harry looked at him, her green eyes cold and unusually assessing; they looked for a moment like his own eyes. Yes, he imagined he looked like that quite often, staring through to the heart of people and asking himself who they were, what they wanted, and how it would affect him.

"We're not friends, Riddle," Harry said, as if she was talking about the weather. "We've never been friends."

Tom felt the smile drip from his face, and he felt uncomfortably bare beneath her gaze. "You're my friend."

That seemed to shock her out of her stoicism, her eyes went comically large, and she took a step back from him, but he continued, "You're the only friend I have ever had."

Saying it like that, it was rather pathetic, but nonetheless it was true. Tom Riddle had never had friends, never had time nor the need of them, until of course she had come along and unwittingly forced herself into the position. He still couldn't see anyone else fulfilling that role, even if he wanted to, but being inside Hogwarts without her…

He had known even in October that somehow that would be worse than having no future at all.

She opened her mouth to say something, but he beat her to it, "But I'm not stupid, Harry, and I can only keep my patience so long as I keep my indifference. If you wanted me to overlook you, Harry, then you should have been anything other than yourself."

"The bloody hell is that supposed to mean?!" she asked, finally losing her temper and returning to something familiar to the girl he'd met only a few months ago.

"It means that I wish you would stay in Hogwarts over the holidays," he said. "It means that I'm going to miss you. It also means that I know you won't write, and I won't see you again until next term at the earliest."

It meant that he was looking forward to the next semester, to watching the fallout of Harry's Quidditch debacle which she didn't seem to appreciate. Oh, she knew it hadn't gotten her immediately what she wanted, Tom Riddle back in everyone's good books, but she hadn't realized that she had bought herself a ticket to the Slug Club, a spot on the Ravenclaw team, and the rivalry of Slytherin's.

They would actively torment and sabotage her now, if she came back and was pressured into being Ravenclaw's Seeker (which she would be, because they would never give that up). What would that look like, he wondered, especially as they studied for their OWLS and prepared for the summer holidays?

He wondered, darkly for a moment, if she had promised to write to Alphard Black.

"Believe me," Harry said with a small, almost self-deprecating laugh, "You won't even notice I'm gone, I'm sure of it."

"For someone who can't help but say what you like and wear your feelings all over your face," Tom said after a very lengthy pause, taking her in piece by piece, from her messy, chaotic curls down to the worn soles of her shoes, "You have alarmingly low self-confidence."

"Huh?!"

"Harry," he said, offering her a charming and wry smile, the kind she hated so very much, "I never forget anyone, but even if I did, I would never forget you."

With that, she hauled herself onto the train, pulling her trunk after her without a word, ignoring as he stared after her and looked for her in compartments. He walked with her, keeping pace easily, until she reached a compartment on his side of the train.

"Where are you going to be?" he asked as she sat with a sigh in her seat. "I want an address."

"To hell with your address!" Harry said, whipping her head to stare out the window in shock shortly replaced by chagrin as she realized that she should have known he'd follow her. "And don't you have somewhere to be? I didn't think they let you out of the castle if you weren't leaving."

"If you haven't noticed," Tom remarked, "I'm on rather good terms with our Head of House."

"You said he deserved a circle in hell to his face," Harry responded, which just caused Tom to grin harder.

"Yes, but I also said tutoring you caused me to have a mental breakdown," Tom said, before adding with a smile a rather damning consequence Harry likely hadn't foreseen, "And I am now expressly forgiven for having seen your talents in Quidditch before anyone else and taking the initiative to invite you to the Slug Club."

The train began to move, Harry poking her head out of the train window to stare after him open-mouthed while he just grinned back at her. She shouted at him, the expletive covered by the sound of the train's whistle, while he just found himself grinning harder back at her even as she drifted away from the school.

"You're welcome!" he called after her, staring long after her head had become nothing more than a little black dot, a pale face with dark hair staring after him as the train sped south towards London.

And just like that, it was Tom alone once again in the station and at the school, held in stasis until she managed to find her way back from wherever it was she was going.

Well, if she was gone anyway, perhaps it was time to start looking back into his family history. Between Harry Evans, the basilisk, and even more Harry Evans, he'd almost entirely forgotten about it.

Marvolo the parselmouth, yes, that would be a good place to start.

* * *

 **Author's Note: And they're off for the winter holidays and exciting adventures that will no doubt go terribly wrong. It'll be fun. New in the world of "When Harry Met Tom" is "Hogsmeade Abides" where Tom and Harry have a quasi-date in Hogsmeade.**

 **Thanks to GlassGirlCeci for betaing the chapter. Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	15. Chapter 15

" _You know how a year to a person is like seven years to a dog?"_

" _Is one of us supposed to be a dog in this scenario?"_

" _Yes."_

" _Who is the dog?"_

" _You are."_

" _I am? I am the dog? I am the dog?"_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _December, 1942_

* * *

It was strange, Harry thought, how small her world was.

She'd never realized it before, Hogwarts and the magical world had always seemed so wonderous and grand, but Harry's world was divided into only a few different corners. There was Little Whinging, which had been the only world she'd ever known for the first eleven years of her life, Hogwarts, the Burrow, Diagon Alley, Hogsmeade, and then…

Nothing, nothing of significance at any rate.

Except she'd never really thought of it that way before.

Maybe it was a side effect of having a madman after your head, maybe it was the fact that there was so much to learn and explore at Hogwarts, but if anything Harry's world had felt much too large. The role she was expected to fill, the girl-who-lived, entirely too big for little Harry Potter from Surrey.

She'd had too much trouble keeping up with her own shadow to wonder what the rest of the world was like.

Funny though, the second she walked into this place, it hit her with the full weight of a sledgehammer. Harry's was a small world after all, and even if she didn't belong in that place, she belonged here even less.

The portkey to Ireland had consumed the vast majority of Harry's savings, to the point where she was in real trouble if this didn't work out, and from there she'd walked her way out of Dublin and into the rolling hills of the countryside and the strange fairy mounds that would transport her underground.

With the approach of the solstice, Harry wondered if they'd made themselves easier to find, because she hadn't even been on the road that long when she heard nightly music drifting through the wind. Almost, she thought, as if it had been an invitation.

It was like walking through Diagon Alley for the first time, everything was bright colors, strange magic, glittering floating light. Except, this was even more so, because while the people looked human you could also tell they weren't human at all. Something besides pointed ears and strange colors of skin and eyes marked them as other even at a glance.

Harry's eye met a tall figure's, impossible to tell if it was a woman or a man, with the golden eyes of a snake. He smiled at her, his smile too wide and teeth far too jagged.

"Don't eat or drink anything," Harry muttered to herself, swiftly looking away and wondering again if this had been her best idea, "Don't get lost in the revelry. Avoid true names, they have power. Don't make bargains. They can't lie."

Oh god, what had she gotten herself into this time?

She continued pushing her way through what seemed like a sidhe version of Diagon Alley, lit up by colored floating lanterns, venders shouting in the streets for the kind of wares you usually only saw in those dive shops in Knockturn Alley.

Worse, Harry wasn't entirely sure she could go back even if she'd wanted to. On wandering in, following the sound of flutes in something of a daze, she'd turned around and lost sight of the entrance aboveground.

She was soon pushed from her spot by throngs of humanoid beings and was currently making her way through the crowd wondering what she was supposed to do next.

She wasn't sure what she had been expecting, maybe David Bowie, but it hadn't struck her that it'd be all that hard to find someone to ask. Except, this didn't seem like the kind of power available to a measly merchant or your any old hobgoblin. If a wizard couldn't do it then Harry was willing to bet that you had to be a king of queen to even approach the kind of power Harry was looking for.

Meeting the eye of what looked like a giant cat-man, Harry couldn't help but turn slowly away and attempt to walk like she belonged here, "You should have stayed at Hogwarts, Harry, you should have stayed at Hogwarts."

Well, no, clearly not. Tom Riddle had made it all too clear that the jig was up, that it'd probably been up for some time, and that had the kind of consequences that Harry didn't want to touch with a ten-foot-pole. Not only that, but it really was getting a little too comfortable there, with Alphard, quidditch, and even Riddle, Harry Evans was slowly but surely carving a place for herself in this world. A world without Voldemort, without having to look in the betrayed faces of her friends, Harry could see it becoming truly tempting.

Why not just leave the world to hang?

The world had been content to leave Harry to hang often enough.

That kind of thinking, that resigned defeat and calm acceptance, it terrified her.

And that very fear as well as her own determination and sense of duty had pushed her all the way to this place. Armed only with some notes from a racist asshole who'd been dead for hundreds of years. As well as her own endless stupidity, Harry had never run out of that yet.

Though, maybe, her endless luck would come into play as well.

It was about at this moment that Harry stopped in her tracks caught off guard by a sudden difference in the place. Looking around, she realized that it was suddenly, eerily, quiet, and that everyone and their cat-brother was staring directly at Harry Potter.

Well, shit.

For a second she wondered if they knew about the whole girl-who-lived thing. Then, blinking, she realized that she was fifty years and a world away from Harry Potter's legendary feats. Whatever they were staring at, it was something else.

God, you could almost hear the sound of a pin drop.

Harry cleared her throat, the sound deafening, "Hello?"

No one said anything back, a small fey child who looked human enough to be a changeling gaped openly at Harry, tugging on her mother's clothing.

"So," Harry continued, "Is there, I don't know, a king or high fairie priest or something? I have a favor to ask?"

Harry smiled, or tried to, but this didn't seem to help things much. They just kept staring, somehow worst than Harry's first day of Hogwarts. Finally, the child pointed down a street lined with more lanterns and flowers than the rest.

"Right, that looks promising," Harry said, nodding her thanks to the child, then opened her mouth to say as much only at the last minute remembering that the fair folk hated empty human platitudes, "Thank… I'll just be going now."

Harry walked purposefully down the street in question, ignoring the silence and the staring that followed her, and put all the bravado she could into every single step. As surreal and creepy as this was, Harry, for the weirdest moment found herself thinking of Riddle.

No doubt he could waltz into this place, no matter how alien and bizarre, and walk down the street as if it'd been paved just for him.

The same way he walked through the halls of Hogwarts before and after his Halloween mental breakdown. In fact, in a weird way, he seemed more certain of himself afterwards, as if he really could now say and do whatever he liked regardless of the consequences.

What Harry wouldn't give for that kind of confidence.

Well, Harry frowned, the confidence minus all his other traits. Harry just wanted that confidence, sometimes, and not the megalomania or unbelievable ego.

It was with that thought Harry reached the end of the winding path. Ahead of her was a clearing, decorated with flowers and slain fantastical beasts, while on a wooden throne an ethereally beautiful man with flaxen hair and dark eyes was seated.

It was like Tom Riddle, Harry thought, only more so. Where Tom Riddle edged being too beautiful, this man truly was too beautiful, and all the more inhuman for it. As Harry approached his throne, head held high, he smiled at her as if he had been waiting for this moment a long time.

They couldn't lie, Harry suddenly reminded herself, whatever came out of his mouth was the true from at least some point of view. Whatever he said, he couldn't truly lie.

Suddenly Harry felt very dirty, human, and unattractive.

When was the last time she'd showered? Yes, that's right, it was before leaving for Ireland. Which was an unfortunate amount of time ago. She should have showered.

"Hello," Harry said, clearing her throat and forcing herself to smile. The man's expression didn't change, in fact that Cheshire Cat grin seemed to become positively more Cheshire Cat in nature.

"I'm, well, I know it's a lot to ask but I'm looking for a very large favor," Harry said, and at his lack of response flailed, "Or we can bargain for it, reasonably bargain I mean, and I won't agree to anything ridiculous either or you can just forget it!"

Harry, however desperate she was, was not selling her firstborn child to the fair folk just to catapult her into 1996.

The man didn't answer any of that though, instead, leaning forward, he asked, "Would you like a drink?"

With a snap of his fingers a goblet of wine, slathered in precious metals and stones, floated its way towards Harry with wine that was so dark it was almost black sloshing inside. Harry looked down at it, eyes widening, then looked back up, "No thank you."

"More's the pity," the man said, summoning the wine to himself instead, "It has been such a long time, hasn't it?"

"… Sure," well, Harry was now lost, especially since he couldn't just be saying this. On some level or another, he believed what he was saying, of course maybe "such a long time" could translate to "never" but that didn't sound right.

"Look," Harry said, deciding that the less time spent in this place the better, "I'm not from around here, and by that I mean I'm actually from England and 1996. The year 1996, you know from the calendar they're using in Great Britain right now, and a lot of other places too. So, right, I'm about fifty years before I'm supposed to be around, fifty-four if you want to be specific, and I'd like to get back to my own time. So, can you help me with that?"

Abruptly, at the man's very intense expression, Harry flushed and babbled, "I'm willing to trade! I mean, anything reasonable, I can trade or help you with something. I'm good at weirdly impossible tasks if you have any of those."

Like not-dying, Harry was great at not-dying.

"Time is not easily meddled with," the man said, "Not even for us."

His smile grew, a touch amused now, "Though, if you wish for it to pass you by in the mortal realm, join the revelry here and you will find that all you wished for and more has passed away from you."

"No, nope," Harry quickly cut in, remembering those alarming notes about the poor people who'd been kidnapped by fairies only to find their way back above ground and find out a century or two had passed by, "Just looking for those fifty-four years, exactly, May of 1996 is all I need."

The man considered Harry, and once again she felt terribly small, and a small sense of unease that she hadn't been laughed at or thrown out. He was looking at her like he was truly thinking about doing it, or doing something, and Harry didn't like the idea that he wasn't finding her any old unimportant person.

She was hard-pressed to imagine that anyone else, even if they were Tom Riddle, could simply have walked straight up to the king and asked him for a favor.

He thought something about Harry Potter was important, without even knowing her name, and Harry didn't like that.

"The solstice arrives soon," the man noted, "It is why the revelry has begun, why the barrier between our worlds has thinned. Until the solstice has passed, I cannot undertake this task of yours even if I wished to."

"But, that means…" Harry trailed off, thinking carefully over what he just said, "That means you'll do it after the solstice."

"I will consider your request after the solstice."

Yeah, that's what Harry had thought he'd said. On the one hand, she wasn't exactly surprised, on the other hand that was a few days away and while she'd packed food and water she was going to have to start rationing herself if she wanted to completely avoid eating whatever was here. Also, while it made some sense, Harry's girl-who-lived senses were tingling and telling her that it was also mighty convenient to keep Harry stuck here longer.

The longer Harry was here, the more of a chance she'd slip up.

She'd ask him again, but given the whole not lying thing, it sounded like he really wouldn't or even couldn't do anything until after the solstice ended.

"Will you not stay?" the man asked, breaking Harry from her thoughts, "It has been so long since you have attended the hunt or the revelry."

Well, that was a disturbing statement.

"You must be confused," Harry said with a small, and rather alarmed, laugh, "I've never been underground before. Especially not before my birth."

The man just smiled, looking for all the world like he knew something very important that Harry herself didn't. Oh, sweet Jesus.

Suddenly, a terrible suspicion dawned on her, "Don't tell me I traveled backwards in time again?!"

"You were not then as you are now," the king cryptically stated.

That was not helping. That could just mean Harry was even older or taller or something crazier than any of that. Except he could have just said that, so either it was more complicated, or he enjoyed being an asshole.

Maybe Harry didn't want to know.

"Right, so for you to consider my quest, do you… need anything?" Harry finally asked, wincing at that last bit, as she was really hoping he didn't. Or, at least, that he didn't want her to do anything just for him to consider her proposal.

Harry was desperate enough that if that was the price she might say yes, but she didn't want to.

Except all of this just seemed entirely too easy and she didn't like it. Harry's life was not filled with easy tasks and adventures, that this was going so smoothly…

"Stay with us," the man said, his face softened, "Join the hunt and the revelry. And after the solstice has passed, I will consider your request."

"But just consider it," Harry said.

Once more, as always, he just smiled.

Well, it looked like Harry was going to spend her holidays not getting wasted underground. Somehow, she had a feeling it was going to be the worst Christmas she'd ever had.

* * *

There was a reason he'd never sat down to do this before now.

Tom was well aware that he had tremendous powers of concentration. Aside from being naturally intelligent he had the work ethic to sit down and power through homework when so many of his peers would rather play gobstones or discuss professional quidditch. This had served him well over the years, but there were times when even for him it was just too much bloody effort.

Apparently, tracing his noble family lineage, was one of them.

At first, he'd tried looking back a few decades, but Riddle was as muggle a surname as ever, and he hadn't had much luck with that. Marvolo, too, in the decades where Tom's grandfather might have been alive was curiously absent.

Which left Tom having to blast it all and start from the very beginning. Tracing the Slytherin family through the centuries and seeing just where it tapered off. The Slytherins had died out relatively quickly, the line ending with a single woman who was noted as having died young and likely in childbirth.

From there it branched into several different lines, many ending within a few generations in an assortment of nasty demises caused by this or that dark magic, only the Gaunts and Selwyns remaining stable. The Selwyns, in turn, before the turn of the century appeared to have died out completely without heirs leaving only the Gaunts. The Gaunts, however, appeared to have the very nice trait of extreme incest, often marrying not only first cousins (a relatively common practice among purebloods) but siblings in order to keep the recessive parselmouth trait prevalent.

Unfortunately, this kept other recessive traits alive, and aside from hemophilia and some more exotic magical diseases that came from chronic dark magic use and bad genetics the attendance to Hogwarts of the family appeared to be less and less over the decades. Tom didn't think they were all dead, but around when the Selwyns were noted as being deceased, they stopped appearing in the Hogwarts registry.

There hadn't been a Gaunt in Hogwarts in near fifty years.

Unfortunately, what this meant was that Tom had lost track of one of the branches somewhere along the way, the world had lost track of one of the branches and Tom Riddle had somehow popped out of the woodworks unnoted, or else Tom was somehow related to one of the Gaunts who had not attended Hogwarts.

Every option was dreadful.

Worse, sitting here in the library, in the dark and the cold, he now had a pounding headache and a bleak, constant, morose thought that he missed Harry. All he could think about, instead of going through the archives yet again, checking the school records and photographs for some hint of his face, was that he bloody missed her.

It had only been a few days, no hint of a letter in sight, and every time he closed his eyes he saw her.

He was ill, it was the only explanation.

Tom Riddle didn't get distracted, even when the reading was unbelievably dry and dull, not for something this important. This was his family, the family as far as the dark arts and noble English lineage were concerned, at the end of this road was his father and what remained of the Slytherin house.

All his expectations, everything beyond a basilisk in the chamber of secrets, was waiting for him.

Yet, here he was, not reading anything and instead leaning on the table with his head buried in his arms thinking about a girl who probably wasn't thinking about him at all.

He wondered if she really was visiting friends, he doubted it, he didn't think she had a friend in the world. Well, a friend aside from him and Alfie Black. Alphard Black though, Tom thought with a frown, well they'd see where he'd land. The family tolerated him and his antics, barely, but if he pushed them too far surely he'd see reason and back away from Evans the mudblood.

Except he hadn't, had he?

No, he'd been pulled unwittingly into the same web Tom Riddle was now trapped in. That strange blend of envy, admiration, and a soft sort of fondness that blossomed despite Tom's every effort to uproot it.

Evans, of course, entirely oblivious even dubious of her innate charm.

But what was she really doing, he thought, if she was as alone in the world as he suspected? Did Evans have a secret lineage of her own that she was following to the corners of the earth? With her defeat of the basilisk, her clear mysterious history of being anything but muggle, he'd believe it.

"Wait a second," he said, sitting upright, as a terrible suspicion began to dawn upon him.

That raw power and ability, her caginess over her past yet honesty when it came to a family she severely disliked, the fact that she had found and opened the chamber of secrets…

"No," he said, flipping open his notes, the sketched-out pages long family tree he'd been putting together and tracing down with a desperation for any hint of Harold, Harriet, Harrison, Hariel, or any derivative there of or else the stray mudblood Evans.

"No," he repeated, looking down, suddenly sweating and feeling both ice-cold and warm at the same time as even without written evidence the suspicion was solidifying.

Hadn't she been especially odd around him in the beginning? Especially wary and aware of him in the same instant before he'd paid her any mind whatsoever? Hadn't she seemed to go especially far out of her way to make him overlook her? Seemed to want to spend as little time with him as possible?

"Oh my god," he said, leaning back, suddenly unable to read as it all fell together.

"But is she my sister or my cousin?" he breathed to the empty library, not sure if he wanted to laugh or cry.

Oh god, he hoped she was a cousin.

They didn't look all that alike, the thick dark hair was a bit damning, but even if he grew his out he doubted it'd be quite as curly or large as hers. Their faces were different enough, her eyes certainly didn't match his in the slightest. What similarities were there could simply be explained by the fact that all purebloods had their fair share of common ancestors.

She was probably his cousin.

He hoped she was his cousin.

"She would have said something," he concluded out loud, trying to force himself into a state of relief.

Harry Evans clearly knew something, knew something about him and a connection between them, and he'd hoped his being her brother would come up. Except… Harry had never seemed to have much interest in him, either as a friend or romantically.

"No, she called me pretty," he said, but it had been said offhand, an almost reluctant admittance as if it had very little to do with her. Objective.

More, if she'd grown up in a pureblood home, one of degenerate squibs, she was likely very used to the idea of not only first cousins marrying but brothers and sisters as well. Hadn't the Gaunt family tree been positively filled with that?

Perhaps, for someone like Harry who honestly sometimes felt like she'd grown up in another country, that was simply an unremarkable norm.

Suddenly, Tom wasn't feeling too well.

Feeling dazed, he closed the book and found himself walking out of the library, through the empty hallways and back to the equally empty dormitory. He had to write her, he had to write her now, but she hadn't given him any hint of an address and he was trapped here.

Even if, miraculously, he wasn't trapped in the castle over the holidays did he really expect her to be somewhere obvious like Hogsmeade?

He stopped in his tracks, another terrible suspicion dawning on him, "Black."

Harry might not write to him, but if Alphard Black had asked (which he undoubtedly had), then she had very likely written to him even with the Black family breathing down his neck at the very idea of a mudblood sending him letters.

Except Tom didn't want to write Alphard Black.

He didn't want to write Alphard Black even if his very life depended on it.

But goddammit, he really wanted to write Harry Evans right now!

"It doesn't matter," Tom told himself, it was only a few weeks, and she wasn't even here anyways. And if he couldn't stop thinking about her, if he'd thought of her as objectively attractive once or twice if you looked at her from the right angle, that didn't necessarily mean anything.

It didn't matter, she'd come back, and even if she fled from the very sight of him he'd get the answers out of her.

"Legillimancy," he said to himself as he stepped into the common room. Yes, he'd put aside family research for now, leave the terrible avenues that could lead him down aside for the moment, and he'd spend the holidays not only continuing his brief flirting with occlumency but pursuing the more advanced art of legillimancy as well.

If she refused to answer, even if she ran, if she just looked him in the eyes he'd bloody well find it.

Yes, everything was fine, and there was a not-insignificant chance Tom wasn't attracted to his sister.

Yes.

* * *

 **Author's Note: As expected, both our heroes vacations are off to a fantastic start. We'll see where it takes them.**

 **Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	16. Chapter 16

" _You know, I have a theory that hieroglyphics are just an ancient comic strip about a character named Sphinxy."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _December, 1942_

* * *

God, Harry was hungry, hungry and thirsty.

Even just sitting here her head was starting to feel lighter than usual, that good old feeling she always got every summer when she had to live on scraps of overcooked bacon. Those were the days. She'd always wanted to owl Ron or Hermione and tell them to mail her snacks, Oreos would have been godsend, except it'd always seemed…

They knew it was bad, Harry had made no secret that her time with the Dursleys wasn't pleasant, but she always got the feeling that Ron and Hermione had no earthly idea how bad it really was. They just got… hints…

The bars on the window in Harry's second year, the fact that Harry could never see them in the summer when Hermione seemed to practically live at the burrow, the way she gorged herself on food every year during the welcoming feast. Harry thought there'd been a lot of signs, had been mortified by them and the idea that it was all so transparent, but either they were too polite to mention it, or they somehow hadn't figured it out.

Ron, maybe, because he didn't really know what muggle life was like. To him, the muggle world was so alien, that maybe the Dursleys were what every family was like. More, as much as he'd never say it or try not to think it, maybe this was how he thought magic hating muggles treated wizards. The Dursleys, for him, were just that one point where the Malfoys happened to be right, if he could even admit that.

As for Hermione…

Harry didn't really know why Hermione had never seemed to catch on. Maybe Hermione and Ron, just a little bit, were tied up in their own worlds and lives. Harry didn't blame them, not really, every year at Hogwarts it was the bloody Harry Potter show so of course they'd want a break from it. The trouble was that Harry wanted that break too, and she'd never get it.

For Harry, it was always going to be the Harry Potter show, even in the summer when no one was watching.

Even in 1942, when Harry Potter didn't even exist yet.

Right, where was she? Oh yes, she was hungry, she was already running low on water, she'd been stuck at this creepy fairy party for hours sitting right there next to his creepy highness, and she had no idea when this solstice was happening.

But on the upside, for once, Harry had yet to do something stupid like eat food, drink wine, or even get down dancing among the fair folk. Not that she could dance, probably the moment she stood up she'd fall over. Plus, even when she was fully fed, Harry and dancing hadn't mixed well. Her first and last horrible dance at the Yule Ball with Ron had warned her off dancing for the rest of eternity.

She felt like she'd been sitting here for days, and the trouble was that she could have been, the light hadn't changed since she'd entered the underground. It had started out a hazy orange, the kind only seen at twilight, and even though hours felt like they'd passed by the sky had remained that strange color.

There was no sun here, no moon, and no stars.

Only that orange fog permeating over where the sky should have been.

Harry truly had wandered far from home this time.

"You truly have forgotten," a voice cut into her thoughts.

Harry's head whipped over to where the king was watching her with those unreadable dark eyes of his. He was seated in the same wooden throne he'd been in earlier, a crown of glowing wild flowers on his head, and the revelry as he called it had come to them as he'd fashioned Harry a chair next to his own.

A seat of honor for something Harry was certain she hadn't earned.

"Forgotten?" Harry asked, that feeling of dread bubbling up in her stomach at his words. She hadn't known him very long, didn't know him at all, in fact, but every time he opened his mouth, he seemed to want something from her.

Maybe it was because he couldn't lie, or maybe it was just who he was, but it felt like every word out of his mouth was very carefully chosen. If he was speaking to Harry, saying anything at all, then there was some reason for it. More, something about him, made Harry thing that those reasons were nothing she'd like.

"You've forgotten this world and its people along with yourself," the man gave her a rather piercing look then, his lips twisting into a smile that was almost amused, "You seem to have even forgotten your true name."

"My true name?" Harry spluttered, because that she certainly remembered, more than anyone here would. Harry Lily Potter until the very end, even if she'd borrowed her mother's maiden name per her own convenience. Unless, of course, this was a "Lion King" type moment in which Harry looking into the water had "forgotten who she was", but that seemed a bit metaphorical and random. Plus, how would he even know that?

Actually, none of this made sense at all, as she still couldn't remember having met him. And she was really, really, really hoping that she didn't get drawn back into time a second time.

"It's how you've donned this mortal glamor," the man said, pointing towards her, "Isn't it? Nothing else could have hidden you inside mortal flesh so seamlessly, as if you were born to inhabit it."

Was she supposed to take that as a compliment? No, wait, was she even supposed to understand that? Dumbledore, Harry always thought, had his infuriatingly cryptic moments. Throwing her at Snape for occlumency lessons, even with their history that was at best described as tense, and then telling her nothing over the summer and…

Well, somehow this asshole was worse than Dumbledore in his most Dumbledore of moments.

She opened her mouth but then closed it, refuting him would be pointless, when someone said weird cryptic shit, they were not looking for you to say, "But actually, not really."

Harry instead, with a sigh, turned her attention back to what the king insisted on calling the revelry. It was… Well, it was certainly a party. There was a lot of drinking, and a lot of dancing, although it all had that feel not only of wild magic but a sense of timelessness. As if these same people and creatures had been dancing the same steps centuries ago.

That only people like Harry had wandered in out of place.

Except, Harry thought with a glance to the king on her right, she wasn't being treated as if she was out of place. No, this was like, well, it was almost like they were welcoming her back after a long journey. And Harry really didn't like the idea of being welcomed back to a place she'd never been.

"So, the solstice," Harry blurted, grabbing the king's attention once again, "When exactly is it happening?"

"Soon," the king replied, vague and unhelpful as always, "We partake in the hunt first."

"Oh, right, you mentioned that," Harry said lamely, before catching onto his words, "Wait, do you mean we as in all of you or we as in I'm included in this."

"It was your bargain, was it not?" the man asked, but in that tone that made it clear he wasn't really asking at all, "For my consideration of your request."

Harry opened her mouth, closed it, and thought back to that meeting. It was hard, the hunger was becoming distracting, but Harry had worked through hunger many times before. Now that he mentioned it… She had implied something to that effect, or else he had, that Harry would hang out, party, and go shoot some foxes or something until the holiday was over. She just, you know, hadn't thought of the implications.

Well, it wasn't like she was the one who had to shoot whatever it was, right? Harry didn't necessarily like the idea of killing some poor woodland creature. More, unless it was with a wand, she hadn't a chance in hell of hitting anything… They weren't expecting her to ride a horse, were they?

"I guess I did," Harry said with a forced grin and a laugh, he smiled in turn, but it wasn't a kind expression. Harry had seen kinder, more genuine, smiles from Tom Riddle.

Strange, Harry thought for a moment, that his face just popped into her head. He was at Hogwarts, like she usually was, and for once her adventures and whatever enemies it contained had nothing at all to do with him. Even with Sirius, in her third year, Voldemort had been standing in his and Wormtail's shadow.

It somehow didn't feel right, in a way, that her world could drift so far from his.

Like the legend of the girl-who-lived, in some impossible way, had outgrown Voldemort.

Suddenly, with an eerie grace, the man stood and offered his hand to Harry, "I see you are impatient. We may begin now, if you so wish."

"If I wish?" Harry asked.

"Of course," the king replied, his smile only growing larger, "It is, after all, a hunt in your honor."

"Oh, that's, um, very kind of you?" Harry asked, cringing at the uncertainty in her voice, knowing fair folk hated empty platitudes. However, the man said nothing, he just kept smiling like there was some joke whose punchline Harry didn't understand yet.

She really didn't like the idea of that.

She could leave, well, she could try to. She'd gotten turned about in this place, but still, she could try and knowing her she'd manage to do something. She didn't have to do this. She didn't—

Except she did. She had to move forward, she had to try, and if she left now because she was scared then she was condemning her friends to death because she was a coward. How could she back down now when she had never backed down before?

Worse, what would happen if she stayed? If she stayed in a world where Tom Riddle knew far too much?

With determination she took the man's hand in her own, pulling herself upwards and towards whatever battlefield awaited her this time, "I'll do it!"

He grinned, a cat ate the canary kind of grin, all teeth and nothing gentle in it at all. The dancers made way, parting and wandering back off into the haze of twilight, and in their place great dark horses leapt from the shadows.

Leaves fell from the trees in a sudden breeze, the wind and leaves forming them into the shape of pale riders upon the dark horses. Carefully, watching as the king moved to the grandest and darkest of the horses, Harry stepped towards the one that remained.

It didn't look solid, it seemed formed of shifting shadows, and yet when Harry scrambled over its back it stayed steady. Sitting there, trying to find a position that was comfortable but not too revealing (which she wasn't doing too well at), a sudden weight appeared in her hands and in one there was a great sword made of a pure white light, in the other a bow nearly as tall as Harry herself carved out of darkness.

Harry was about to ask if, perhaps, she could just watch instead but they were already moving out, the horses galloping forwards with Harry's moving along with them. She didn't steer it anywhere, didn't know how to, but somehow it knew where to go in an eerily smooth gait. The clearing and remains of the feast disappeared, that dull orange light diminishing as they moved into the trees, and soon everything was black.

Except, no, there, a glimpse of white light, the color of Harry's fancy new sword darted through the trees. Harry leaned in closer, trying to make out more than a white blur. There… It looked like someone was riding it, an equally pale figure made of light, a man maybe. Squinting, she could make out glowing antlers, a stag's body, and the form of a tall man in softly glowing muggle suit on top of it.

Next to her, the king, with a smile, drew out his bow, knocked an arrow, and aimed for the stag.

A stag, a glowing stag… Harry had seen this stag before, she realized in a dawning sense of horror. Not often, but often enough, only a few days ago in fact. The stag, sprinting through the forest, was a perfectly replica of Harry's patronus. They weren't hunting deer, they were hunting Harry's patronus.

Harry kicked the horse, trying to get it to turn and move, but it wasn't really her horse. It wasn't, in fact, a horse at all. It instead glided forward with the others, in pursuit of Harry's patronus come to life. With a curse she threw herself off and started sprinting forward, lungs straining as she ran faster than she ever had in her life towards the stag and whoever the bloody hell was riding it.

There was no thundering of hooves behind her, the horses were silent phantoms, but Harry could feel their presence just the same. A deathly chill at her back that raised the hair on the back of her neck.

"Must run faster, must run faster!" Harry chanted breathlessly to herself as she pushed her legs forward.

She couldn't even see the stag anymore, but it felt like the horses had changed course, they were chasing her now.

Oh god, she was going to die, they were going to kill her. Well, no, they would have killed her already, but if they shot her stag, she had the distinct feeling that she'd probably be wishing she was dead.

She should never have come here. She was going to die here or was going to be trapped here forever, they were going to eat her patronus for dinner! Even Tom Riddle, even Voldemort in his miniature alarming form, was safer than this.

Harry felt a hand on the collar of her shirt, with dread she felt herself helplessly yanked upwards, only instead of the grinning king she found herself pulled onto the stag, held in place by the glowing man riding it.

She had little time to feel relief though, or anything at all, as the woods abruptly ended at a gaping crevasse that would certainly lead to their painful death. And the rider wasn't stopping.

"Are you crazy?!" Harry asked, but he didn't answer, instead pushed ahead, forcing the stag into a sprint, while Harry had only a second to pray to her god of horrible luck to please let her live through this one.

She had enough time to scream as they jumped and… And for a moment they were weightless, floating across the gorge, and Harry turned behind to see the death horses skidding to a stop, the king clambering off to the very edge of the cliff to stare after her. She couldn't make out his face though, only his pale silhouette against the forest.

And just like that gravity was back and they touched down to the other side, the stag sprinting forward into the woods again, out of the sight of the hunt.

* * *

"Holy sweet mother of Jesus and Merlin," Harry gasped as they drew to a stop, practically throwing herself off the stag, and onto the forest floor, prostrating herself as if to the ancient gods of this place, "I am alive. I can't actually believe I'm alive."

Slowly, carefully, he slid off as well, sparing only a glance behind him towards the woods that, so far, were empty. Then, as if pulled in by a magnet, his eyes returned to her.

She flopped over onto her back, eyes closed, breathing out in relief and exhaustion, "I swear to God, this has to be in the top ten dumbest things I have ever done. I owe karma big for bailing me out this time. No, maybe I've already paid for this. I don't know if it's worth all those occlumency lessons with Snape, or summers at Number 4 Privet Drive, but damn it's worth something."

She laughed, an exhausted breathless thing, "Maybe it's worth Malfoy the bloody ferret, putting up with him probably paid for this in advance."

It was…

He had never seen her in person before. He caught glimpses of her, or, more accurately, he only saw what she saw of herself. Inside her mind, the glasses were larger, her legs skinnier, her hair larger and more wild, and always with that hint of girlishness even as she continued to age. As if Harry herself could never quite picture herself as a woman, only ever a girl-who-lived, never an adult worthy of stepping into a grander role.

She cut herself short, he'd known that for years of course, but it was another thing entirely to see it.

She hadn't looked at his face yet, been too preoccupied by her latest and greeted near-death experience. He wondered when she would, for the moment, she didn't seem inclined to. For the moment, he had the odd hopeful feeling, that perhaps she wouldn't feel the need to. Perhaps he was somehow familiar enough, comforting enough in presence alone, that she wouldn't question his being her or what he was.

This place, after all, was filled with far stranger and more dangerous things than him.

She opened her eyes though, too green and too striking without the glasses to hide them and glanced over at him. There was a moment, again, where she processed his face, unfamiliar when shrouded in light. Then a flicker of confusion, of horror, and then angered determination as she scrambled to her feet and pointed the sword gifted to her straight at him.

"Voldemort!" she hissed, as he'd known she would.

"What are you doing here?" she asked, but it came out as a threat rather than a question. Somewhere over the years Harry had become dangerous and it showed now in her voice. Gone was that eleven-year-old girl pushed into worlds far beyond her imagining.

Still, he couldn't help but smile, "I am afraid that I am not Lord Voldemort."

There was a certain irony, in stating that out loud. It was, after all, an anagram of his own name, "I am Lord Voldemort", it had been designed to help him transcend Tom Riddle. Yet, all the same, he was not and no longer would ever be Lord Voldemort.

The sword didn't waver, "Then who the bloody hell are you supposed to be?"

"I am," he paused, thought over the question, it was… She hadn't asked him before, or rather, her subconscious mind had never asked him before.

In the beginning, it had been so dark, and so cold. It had been like being dragged under, continually drowning in the depths of her mind. Then… By the time she had come for him, that sliver of her unconscious mind had come for him, she had already made up her mind.

She was much younger, before Hogwarts or her letter, she had to have been eight or so but in those days he'd lost track of everything, even himself.

She'd looked at him, even in her own mind wearing Dudley's oversized cast offs, and said, "This is your cupboard, isn't it?"

She'd smiled, too cheerfully as she'd pulled him out of the black misery she'd been drowning him in for so long, guided him towards the rainbows in the distance that even in the darkest corners of her mind were visible, "I hate my cupboard, you know, I tried to leave it today. Didn't get too far, but—I just realized, that I've been pushing you in here, the same way Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia have been pushing me in there. And I don't want to live in that cupboard anymore, I've decided that someday, somehow, I won't. So, I think you shouldn't either."

"Do you have any idea who I am?"

She looked at him, then, really looked, and asked, "Does it matter?"

It was harder, in this place, to hear her thoughts. When her soul had been dragged out of her body in the form of a stag, he'd been dragged out with it, so he had no idea if, somewhere inside that head of hers, the Harry Potter that lived within Harry Potter was still asking if it even mattered.

The Harry Potter confronting him now, however, seemed to think it mattered more than anything in the world.

Finally, with a small, bitter, smile, he answered, "I am Tom Riddle's Ghost of Christmas Future."

The sword lowered, just a fraction, and she looked at him as if he'd just confessed to being pregnant with her child, "You're the bloody what?"

It was too bad, Tom thought that was rather clever, the subconscious Harry would have laughed.

He regarded her again, wondering just how much he should tell her. He… She was already, in many ways, far too close to the truth of the matter. That diary, that bloody diary, had made it all too clear to Albus Dumbledore exactly what Harry Potter didn't even know she was hiding.

If she knew…

He didn't know what she'd do, if she truly knew.

Still, deep down, she knew more than she thought she did. He had told her too much over the years, and she was cleverer than she sometimes thought or wished to be, and her subconscious mind had put much of it together. The trouble was they'd been together so long her subconscious mind no longer cared about the invasion. Instead of an intruder, Tom was treated as an expatriate, until, that is, Harry realized what had happened on any sort of conscious level.

"Are you going to answer?" Harry asked, "Or do I have to cut your head off?"

Well, hadn't she gotten bold? She might say that to Voldemort, if she was in the mood for pointless bravado, but here it was said with such confidence. She said it the way she might say it to the young Tom Riddle here, as if she had entered a fight she already knew she'd won. In this case, because somewhere in that head she knew that they meant each other no harm.

They were simply going through the motions.

But what motions they were. She looked every inch the hero he'd imagined her to be, a prince, who had that odd quirk of being a woman. Even in torn clothing, face streaked with sweat and dirt, hair matted, she looked like a slayer of dragons and dark lords.

At that thought, he smiled, and the words tumbled out, "Do you remember your… connection, to the dark lord?"

Hary blinked, blinked again, and finally the sword lowered completely. She stabbed it into the earth, leaning on it as she peered forward at him, "Yeah?"

"I am the pieces, the memory, of the dark lord's power that he left behind inside your scar," the words all but screamed horcrux, just as the diary's words had screamed it so long ago, but Harry was uninformed and more muggle than people gave her credit for. Memory, to her, wasn't nearly as dangerous a word as it should be.

"Huh?" Harry asked, "Wait, you mean you're the…"

"The parseltongue, the visions, the physical manifestation of your connection to him," Tom said, watching as Harry, tentatively, reached up to her bangs and felt for her scar in alarm.

"And you live in my scar?"

"Well," Tom said, backtracking ever so slightly, "Live is a strong term, it's…"

His eye fell on the stag, Harry's mortal soul, looking out into the forest resolutely for signs of the hunters who wished to destroy it and everything that kept her connected to the human world, "It's like your patronus. Your patronus lives inside you, but it's not conscious, it is instead the embodiment of all that makes you human. Things here, Harry, are more real than they are out there."

Harry looked at him, eyes wide, and blurted, "Don't bloody say my name!"

Ah, right, well, he had forgotten what they meant to each other out here in this world between worlds. Here, he was not an advisor or tenant, but instead a stranger at best and enemy at worst. He decided to say the first thing likely to distract her, "You allow the current Tom Riddle to say it, don't you?"

Sure enough, she flushed, stomped her foot like an oversized toddler, and said, "No I don't! He did that all on his own and he won't stop and—"

Her eyes flashed in sudden realization, she pointed at him an accusation and declared, "And you're changing the subject!"

He couldn't help the smile, or the laughter, she was…

God, she was always herself, wasn't she? Inside her head and outside of it. For so long he had never understood her, never understood how knowing what he was, or at least that he was not a force of good in her mind who meant her well, she had both forgiven and sheltered him. Sheltered him even through Voldemort's return, the revealing of Tom Riddle's true face in her second year, and the pain of his resurrection.

For years, he had pushed her, waited for her to buckle and break and turn against him. All it would take was a word to Dumbledore, a slip during those occlumency lessons with that bastard Severus Snape, it would take nothing at all, but she never did.

And she never threw him in the back of her mind either, back into that pit of despair and self-loathing she'd instinctively tried to drown him in, not once.

"Yes," he said, wiping away the tears of mirth, "I suppose I am. Regardless, we should get moving, it would not be wise to let them find us."

She blinked, looked behind her in alarm, remembering that she had fled with him for a reason. She rushed forward to join him as he began walking with the stag, seeking shelter in this place where every element would turn against them.

"So," she said as she caught his eye, "This means we're working together then, is it?"

They had been working together, as she put it, for longer than she would be able to comprehend. However, she wouldn't want to hear that, couldn't hear that.

Instead, he mused softly, "I suppose."

"If you betray me," Harry said, eyes narrowing, and something of his own cold persona entering her eyes. That compassionless determination that allowed her to move forward, beyond the pain and doubt, and do what must be done when all others would falter, "Or try to kill me, I will gut you."

"I am well aware of that," he said, he had always been at her mercy since the very beginning.

"Why are you like this?" Harry snapped, as if he was playing some dangerous and clever game far over her head, "Voldemort's nothing like this, and neither is your prettier younger half!"

"I am tired," he admitted, and God it was still true. He was still exhausted, even after all these years.

By the time they'd tried to destroy Harry Potter, when the split had occurred and he, the unintended horcrux had been made, he'd had no reason to give for why he was alive. In the split, in that moment of looking back at himself burned alive by his own hubris, he'd had a single thought. That this, after everything, was it.

This was the end, after all the death, all the blood, all of the groveling, patience, and playing political games he didn't care for. After everything, there was only this moment, the pain and then nothing. And it had seemed so pointless.

He'd had no reason to live anymore. If, in fact, he'd ever had a reason to be alive.

So, when Harry's mind, the shadows of her heart, had come for him he hadn't struggled. He'd instead sat there, letting them slowly but surely drag him into the dark where he would fester until she finally died.

"I'm tired!" Harry snapped back, looking more alarmed than ever, but even in her alarm…

She didn't know it, couldn't possibly realize it, but she was the only friend he'd ever had. Such a pity, he only met her after he'd died.

"Well, I also told you," he said with a smile, "I'm the Ghost of Christmas Future, I am the memory of what Tom Riddle might have been."

"… Really?" Harry asked, eyebrows raising, and for a moment forgetting herself and just who she was talking to as she noted, "Because you kind of sound like Dumbledore."

Oh, oh that hurt. He clutched at his heart, grimacing, and bemoaned, "Must you aim straight for my heart, Harry?"

She laughed. For a moment she seemed to forget where she was, who she was with, and genuinely laughed. With that, he knew that whatever she suspected or put together it would be fine.

After all, she was Harry Bloody Potter as she so often put it. If she only put her mind to it, wanted it, then nothing was beyond the realm of possibility.

* * *

 **Author's Note: Yes, we're going there people.**

 **Thanks for reading and reviewing, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	17. Chapter 17

_"Repeat after me. Pepper."_

 _"Pepper."_

 _"Pepper."_

 _"Pepper."_

 _"Waiter, there is too much pepper on my paprikash."_

 _"Waiter, there is too much pepper on my paprikash."_

 _"But I would be proud to partake of your pecan pie."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _December, 1942_

* * *

Some important things to note about Harry Potter's latest, greatest, and most surreal adventure yet.

First, she didn't even know how long it'd been since she'd eaten anything, since she was currently in a land without a sun, but God she would kill for some treacle tart right about now. As it was, walking along, she'd started eyeing the glowing mushrooms growing out of mildewed shadow and wondered if they were as psychedelic and poisonous as they looked, or if she could just try her Potter luck out and hope for the best.

Second, she was lost in endless Irish woods that, according to her guide, were "really more like a metaphor of woods", and there had yet to be any end in sight. As a result, her feet were really starting to hurt. Harry wouldn't call herself unathletic—she killed at Quidditch, as noted by the Ravenclaw team—but apparently that didn't translate to walking for miles and miles and miles.

Her pain was not helped by the fact that she now had that song about walking five hundred miles stuck in her head.

Third, she was being chased by some crazy faerie king who either thought Harry was going to time travel again or that Harry had somehow been in the past had been… some kind of faerie queen? It'd been very unclear. Harry hadn't wanted to think about it, and she still didn't want to think about it. The point was that the man was after her bloody soul and that if he did manage to hit it with an arrow, that would be "extremely bad".

Which led her to number four: joining her on her flight into the woods, away from crazy people trying to hack up her human soul, was her soul in the form of her stag patronus (currently treated as a pack mule carrying Harry's newly acquired magic sword and bow) and the ghostly specter of an adult Tom Marovlo Riddle.

A Tom Riddle that claimed to have been the leftover Voldemort goo that had been inhabiting her scar since 1981. You know, that good old chap that gave her all his evil powers like talking to snakes, visions of his evil schemes, and unbearable migraines. Living in her brain, completely unnoticed, since 1981.

Somehow, even with all the other garbage that was happening, Harry was really stuck on number four.

Especially since he did not match her mental image of Tom Riddle at any stage of his Tom Riddle life cycle. For obvious reasons, he wasn't the evil snake incarnation of Tom Riddle that had blessed the world with his presence since 1981. He also wasn't evil baby Voldemort, evil Quirrell Voldemort, or moody teenage Tom Riddle. That said, if someone had asked her to picture thirty-something-year-old Tom Riddle before he'd gone and messed up his face with dark magic, she would not have pictured this guy.

It was hard to tell, he glowed a bit too brightly to stare at for too long, but she was pretty sure he was wearing a muggle suit. Not just any muggle suit either; she was ninety-percent certain that he was wearing tweed, the quintessential muggle nerd suit worn only by those at least fifty years old. Worse, he was so… nice.

Tom Riddle of 1942, the infinitely more human and compassionate edition than those past 1980, would have cracked some snide remark or said something at the very least cuttingly witty, poking fun at someone's misfortune. Tom Riddle practically oozed cynicism and the sardonic, he just couldn't seem to help himself, and as a result any emotion that was even slightly squishy and heartfelt left him at a complete and utter loss.

This one though—he was mostly quiet, lost in thought, but when he did talk, he was… Harry didn't want to say he was at peace with himself, enlightened, but compared to every iteration of Voldemort she'd met, he lacked the constant sense of anger or bitterness. That was it: every version she'd met, from Tom Riddle to Voldemort, was always angry. Even when the diary had been trying to hide behind a charming smile, there'd been that cynical bitterness directed towards Hagrid, his scapegoat. This one wasn't angry at all, he was just… what had he called it—tired?

Tired and secretly living in her brain for fifteen years.

Jolly good; Harry should have known her life could still get worse.

"Are you alright?" he asked, glancing back over his shoulder at her, his eyes a strange translucent sort of glowing white to match her patronus. Good god, did that make him her patronus too? He kind of looked like it, but she really didn't want to think that the next time she cast that spell he'd come sprinting out of her wand.

For one thing, she'd never be able to explain it away.

"Peachy," Harry responded shortly, before wincing, and asking, "Just, you know, still stuck on this 'you living in my brain' bit."

"Ah," he said.

Ah—that was it? That was all he had to say?

"Ah?" she asked, eyebrows raising high enough that she felt like they'd go and disappear up into her head.

Here he gave a small smile, less cutting than Tom Riddle's ever were, and he parroted back, "Ah."

… What Twilight Zone had she stumbled into?

"Seriously," Harry said, shaking her head and trying to figure out what to even ask, "You've been in my head since—"

"October 31st, 1981," he said, a spring in his step as he turned away from her, talking a bit too loudly as if narrating a scene, "Not to be confused with October 31st, 1982, which was a day of drunken celebration by the wizarding masses partly to celebrate the ancient pagan holiday of Samhain, but mostly to celebrate the miraculous defeat of the dark lord Voldemort a year prior. A tradition which I understand persists to this very day. Well, up to 1996 at the very least."

"Wait, what?" Harry asked, stumbling and stopping in her tracks. He kept doing that, and if he were anyone else, well, if he were any other Tom Riddle, she'd say it was to distract her, but no, she thought… It seemed like this was his way of trying to be funny.

"You haven't been paying much attention, Harry," the man noted, his smile still there and filled with mirth, "Lost in your own world on the 31st for rather good reason, what with the trolls and what the date means to you personally, but the word Harry Potter Day has been thrown around in your presence."

"Harry Potter Day?!" Harry gaped, not liking the sound of that at all, no, not one bit.

He gave her a look, as if he was almost disappointed he had to point it out to her, and said, "Harry, you're bigger than both Jesus and the Beatles to Britain's wizarding population. If you didn't have at least one national holiday, it'd be a travesty. As a bonus for the ministry, it helps flush out the lingering druid culture that they've been just dying to get rid of for centuries."

There was far too much Harry could say to that, to any of this, but then she realized that he had succeeded. He'd managed to distract her in only a single sentence with seemingly barely any effort at all, and the only thing Harry knew now was that maybe Halloween was actually Harry Potter Day and she was going to kill Ron for never warning her.

"We're getting off topic!"

"We are?" the man asked. "Forgive me, I had forgotten what the topic was in the first place."

"The topic is what have you been doing in my head for the past fifteen years?!" Harry shouted, and in a normal forest, her words would have probably sent birds flying out of tree. However, there apparently weren't any birds underground.

Tom Riddle, the new and improved edition, appeared entirely unbothered as he remarked, "Longer."

"What?"

"It's probably closer to sixteen years now, what with all the time travel."

Harry was going to be sick. She slowed to a stop, looked ahead at the endless horizon, and all she wanted to do was sit down and have a good cry. That's all she wanted to do. How was it, she wondered, that she could never seem to escape Tom Riddle?

"Do you need to stop?" he asked, and, God, did he look concerned? Yes, he looked genuinely concerned for her well-being.

"Yes," Harry said, nodding and sinking to the ground, "I need to sit for a while."

He looked down at her, then over at her stag which had stopped along with her, and sank to the ground across from her. His legs were too long, too inflexible, and he spent a good minute just trying to get them into a comfortable and manageable position. This started with crossed legs that wouldn't lie fat, awkwardly bent knees that were much too tall, and finally the compromise of one bent and the other laid out straight on the ground.

They sat in perfect silence.

Finally, he said with a small, exhausted, sigh, "It is a lot to take in, I realize that. I suppose I had hoped that we wouldn't have to have this conversation."

Harry said nothing; there was nothing to say, what was someone supposed to say about that? And did he have to phrase it like the birds and the bees?

"Truly, I have been doing next to nothing inside your head," he said. "For eight years or so I was buried so deep in your subconscious that we were barely aware of each other's existence. Later, I just… was around, I suppose is the best way to put it."

"Around?" Harry said dully, but he nodded as if that was a perfectly legitimate word to use.

"Read books, listened to music, watched tele, watched your memories and life go by, gave advice that you never listen to… Nothing drastic, nothing of any importance to anyone. I was just there."

"Then what about the snakes?" Harry said, her eyes narrowing. "What about the visions and the headaches?"

"That first is all you," he said, entirely unperturbed by her suspicious glare. "You're the one who draws upon the power, my power; I just lie back and think of England."

Harry choked on her own spit and began coughing, even as her face flushed in mortified despair. As he watched, he nodded slowly, as if confirming something. "Right, yes, I could have put that better. You see, I have this mistaken assumption that I'm terribly clever. It hasn't been working out for me lately."

Harry finally forced herself to breathe, gasping in air and willing her face to cool down and return to a normal shade. "And the other two?!"

"That would be Voldemort often unwittingly drawing upon your connection through me. Which, in that case, it truly is a bit like lying back and thinking of England. It's no more pleasant for me than it is for you."

Well, Harry didn't know if she believed that. She would always think a Tom Riddle in her head would take great joy in causing Harry unbearable pain, but something else he said struck her: "Voldemort, you refer to yourself in the third person, then?"

"Ah, no, remember, I am not Voldemort," he said, motioning to himself and shaking his head insistently. "Like the Lord of the Rings, there can only be one Voldemort, and he does not share power."

Harry choked again.

"Right, sorry," he said with a stretched grimace that tried and failed to be a smile, "It clearly has yet to cement in that I'm not nearly as funny as I think I am."

He had to stop talking, clearly, or else Voldemort's final defeat over Harry would be suffocation through shock. Harry slowly forced herself to breathe, in and out, thinking of nothing, there was only the now and finding out what the bloody hell was going on.

"This feels like a really deep rabbit hole," Harry finally said. "A really deep rabbit hole that will just keep going. So, I'm going to stop, and we're just going to establish some… ground truth here."

"Probably for the best," he said with a particularly earnest nod that just looked oddly adorable, as if they were talking about the bloody weather.

Right, the facts, start with the facts. "First, you're Voldemort's… leftover power stuck in my brain, and you've been there pretty much since the beginning."

"Correct," he said.

"Second, you don't mean me any harm. You would have killed me already, you would have… Done something by now instead of just sit there in glowing tweed."

He nodded again, flashing her one of Tom Riddle's patented charming smiles. "One might even say that, if life were a game, you and I would be on the same side."

That was a rather large assumption to make, one Harry deeply wanted to question, but goddammit they were being pursued and they'd already been sitting here for ages and Harry just didn't have time for that garbage.

"Right, moving along," she said instead, "Third, you have some idea what the fair folk want with me, and please tell me you have a way out of here!"

Then they could deal with the whole him being in her brain, what he really wanted, and all of that business. They had to have priorities here, and not getting eaten by evil magic elves was going to take the top slot.

Here he paused, hesitated with a very conflicted look on his face, and finally said, "It's complicated."

Oh, she was going to kill him, even if he was the oddly nicest Tom Riddle she had ever met.

"We don't have time for complicated!" Harry spat back.

"Technically, time doesn't exist here, not the way it does in the mortal world," he said, holding up a glowing hand to stop her tirade. "It could have been seconds since you stepped in this place, it could be centuries, there's no true way to tell."

"You mean—"

He finished that horrifying thought for her, "That we could have blown right by 1996 and then some? Yes, Harry, I do mean that. Which was why I've been telling you for months that attempting to catapult yourself forward in time using the fair folk is—"

He pinched the bridge of his nose, forcibly cutting himself off with a truly aggravated sigh, "Never mind that, it's too late for that now. The point being, we should have time, even before they catch up to us. It's why I've let us stop."

"Oh, well thank you," Harry said, sarcasm dripping from her voice, "For letting us stop, like you're the one in charge."

"Would you rather take the lead?" he asked, full well knowing that as usual Harry had absolutely no idea what she was doing or where she was going. No, that wasn't right, this was even worse than usual.

"Right, what they want from you…" he paused again, an entirely too meaningful pause for Harry's liking, as if he knew the exact answer and was now mulling about the best way to say it. He had the look of a doctor contemplating how best to tell someone in the hospital waiting room that their grandmother had stage four cancer.

"You are… far more powerful than you've ever allowed yourself to realize," he finally said.

Now, wasn't that delightfully vague and ominous? Also, thankfully, just dead wrong. Harry let out a laugh, almost relieved in a way. "Oh, you must be joking. You buy into that whole girl-who-lived balderdash?"

He said nothing, just kept looking at her, his eyes dead serious.

She motioned to herself, smiling now, unable to help it with giddy relief. "Seriously, I'm just Harry. I know there's this whole girl-who-lived business, but—"

"Exactly, Harry," he interjected, and this time there was no hint of a fond smile or eccentric humor. "There is that whole girl-who-lived business. Consider, for a moment, what that truly means."

Harry's smile slipped away, and her laughter died down. "What it means? I've been the girl-who-lived since I was eleven, I think I know—"

"You've become desensitized to it," he spoke over her again. "Worse, you were too young, you never forced yourself to consider what it was beneath the surface of this brand new world and the hero worship that followed you. It became, for better or worse, just another strange aspect of wizarding Britain. There were chocolate frogs and you were Harry Potter, the girl-who-lived."

He leaned in closer, shifting, until he was staring her directly in the eye and she couldn't see past him. "Harry, listen to me. The reason you are the girl-who-lived is because no one else, in the history of the killing curse's existence, has ever lived. No mother, no father, no son, and no daughter has ever survived it under any condition. And yet you, only a year old, did and no one knows why."

"Dumbledore said—"

"Dumbledore loathes uncertainty, he can't live with it, can't even conceive it," Riddle spat back at her, "And so he lives and dies by theories that allow him to understand while Voldemort remains shrouded in darkness. Love and sacrifice, Harry, as powerful of magics as they truly are, cannot deflect the killing curse. Albus Dumbledore has forced himself to forget that small fact. More, it serves his purposes, if you believe that you are utterly unremarkable."

She didn't like the way he said that, felt herself grow cold, and asked, "What do you mean?"

"Never mind that." That was said too quickly, as if he realized he'd said something he shouldn't. "As for leaving this place… That, I believe, may be up to you."

"Me?!" Harry asked. "In case you don't remember, even though you were in my head at the time, I kind of lost the entrance—"

"Not that," he said and, hesitantly, slowly, he reached out to take her hand in his. "Harry, you are heir to powers greater than you or I can begin to conceive. If you want to leave, Harry, all you have to do is will it."

"… That is bullshit," Harry said, and whatever moment they'd just had there was broken. "You sound like a motivational cat poster."

"Yes, well, you are a motivational cat poster, Harry," he said, rolling his eyes and attempting to look as if he was still cool. "You honestly believed that you defeated Quirrell in your first year due to the power of love and friendship."

"I did beat him—"

"You lit him on fire!" Tom said, bringing up his hands as if they were particularly damning evidence. "You stuck your hands on his head and melted his face off! Where is the friendship in that?!"

He… had an alarmingly good point there. But still, Harry held up her own hands to stop him, looked at him, and repeated his thoughts back to him slowly, "So, what you're saying is… that if we want to get out of here, all I have to do is want to get out of here."

"Yes."

She waited for him to figure it out, waited one second, then two, then blurted it out, "Then why are we still here?"

* * *

"That's it," Harry moaned as she shuffled forward with all the liveliness and cheer of an inferi, "This isn't the worst adventure I've ever had, less dead bodies is greatly appreciated, but I'm really not digging all of this walking."

They'd started back up again after their little break, when Tom had revealed the alarmingly simple solution to their problem and hadn't stopped again since. Somehow, in that small amount of time, she'd seemed to have gotten used to him.

Likely, she was telling herself that it was pragmatic. She and Tom Riddle were stuck with each other for the moment, pursued by a greater threat, and there was no time or point in blowing him off or dealing with him now when he could be dealt with later.

There was some truth in that, but beneath that, the truth that was driving her in this instance was that she knew him. Her subconscious mind was more familiar with him than she had been with anyone else in the world; he knew her and she knew him in turn, and the conscious mind couldn't stand against that for very long.

The priorities, his lack of apparent threat, those were just the excuses she could give himself.

However, it was not his job to point that out to her. That one, he'd leave her to figure out on her own.

No, instead his mind was dwelling on the past, on a door inside Harry Potter's mind that Severus Snape had never stumbled across in all her occlumency lessons no matter how hard he'd tried to find it. One whose existence Harry Potter would not simply balk at but would laugh at, as if whoever spoke of it had gone mad.

Even when the evidence of its existence kept piling higher and higher until to Tom it seemed a wonder that any thinking being could deny it.

October 31st, 1981. The death of Quirinus Quirrell ten years later in 1991. Surviving the poison of the basilisk before the administration of phoenix tears in 1992. The dementors in 1993. The time travel in 1996. And the basilisk again, with no phoenix at all, in 1942. The fact that she could now walk about with her soul sucked out of her body…

In Harry's mind there was a great black door with no decorations and no door handles, nothing more than a stone slab really, and carved onto its surface in stark letters were the words, "The Power He Knows Not"

When Harry had moved him, in the beginning, from the back of her mind and closer to the front of it, they'd stopped by it. It had been beside the cupboard beneath the stairs in her mind, juxtaposed with the small cramped quarters and looming ominously.

He'd stopped, stared up at it in quiet wonder and unease. He'd been mindlessly following her until that point, stuck in a surreal haze, a part of him still trapped in the shadows of self-loathing that she had instinctively bound him in for so many years.

Compared to that place, to the rainbows they were now following, the cupboard beneath the stairs, it was something that did not belong.

"Don't open it."

He'd turned to look at her and, for a moment, she hadn't looked like a little girl. She was just as small, her hair as dark and wild, but there was something in those green eyes that wasn't supposed to be there.

"I'm sorry?" he asked, his voice rough from disuse, grating against his throat.

"Don't open the door," she repeated.

He looked back to the stone door, then towards her. "What is it?"

She didn't answer, just repeated, "Don't open it, never open it."

"What happens if it opens?" he asked, but she didn't answer, and later she would pretend as if there wasn't any door at all. That the cupboard beneath the stairs was the darkest thing that lingered in the corners of her mind.

It never did open, it never budged, but sometimes… Sometimes, in the most desperate of situations, he could feel it shifting ever so slightly and something leaking out of it. The power he knows not.

That door, whatever it was a metaphor for, was the root of everything. It, he believed, was the secret behind the girl-who-lived and all the other unacknowledged miracles that had happened since. Worse, all the miracles she had unwittingly caused were only a fraction of whatever the power was.

Yes, he believed that if she wanted it badly enough, she could drag them out of this realm and into the mortal world with ease. The faerie king, whoever the hell that even was, Tom believed knew it too. It was why he was going to such lengths to trap her here and destroy her mortal spirit.

Perhaps she could even transport them to what was left of 1996 after what she'd done to 1942 (an alarming thought was that Tom Riddle, her new Tom Riddle of 1942, would never be the same after all this). However, she had to want it badly enough to acknowledge and crack open the door.

She would have to give up being Harry Potter and embrace the girl-who-lived.

Harry would never do that.

"Right, so, how am I supposed to do this again?" Harry asked, whined really, leaning on her stag and looking at it longingly, clearly wondering if she could hop on its back and let it do the walking.

"Apparate?" he said after a pause, that could work. Harry's… willful ignorance and laziness often played to her favor. Harry had never bothered to study the limits of magic, perhaps a self-defense mechanism of sorts that prevented her from looking at her own abilities too closely. It was more or less in line with her thought that she'd lit a basilisk on fire via accidental magic caused by a concussion.

She was still the same girl who insisted that the wind conveniently blew her up onto the roof in the school yard.

"… I don't know how to do that," Harry said slowly, to which he couldn't help but smile and remark, "Well, there's no time like the present."

She sighed, apparently not liking this answer, and stared glumly at the ground for a few moments. Then, looking back up, she asked, "What do you think the faerie king wants with me anyway?"

"You are a being of great power," Tom said carefully, "I imagine it would behoove him to have some control over that power and tie it to his kingdom."

Voldemort, if he knew what she was, if he had even a sliver of sanity remaining to him, would have done much the same. Alas, he'd sacrificed his kingdom for an infant and a half-heard prophecy. Voldemort, thy name is Oedipus Rex, and thou hast murdered thy father and married thy mother.

That said, he didn't want to tell her too much. For one, she wouldn't believe him, would willfully reject him if he insisted upon the truth. For the other… It did not behoove him if she wandered too close to the true nature of things, of what she was and what he was as well. He didn't know what, in truth, waited for them down that road, but for now he would rather avoid it.

She snorted, amused again, amused as always by the idea of herself as some creature whose power stretched beyond human imagination. "No, but really, he acted like he knew me or something… Do you think I'm his reincarnated queen or something? Oh my god, I bet I'm his reincarnated dead wife… God, she must have done a lot of shit to end up being me."

"You aren't his dead wife," Tom said. That he was fairly certain of—well, as much as one could be certain of anything with Harry Potter. Still, Tom imagined the sexual overtures would be far more blatant were that the case.

"Then what am I supposed to be?" Harry asked, before frowning. "Time travelling, again? Bloody hell, I better not be time travelling again. I swear, if this spits us out backwards, if I end up going to Hogwarts with the founders I am going to cut someone."

"I… don't think that either," he said slowly, and this was true; he supposed it was possible, but the man had implied that it wasn't that simple. He'd said Harry was different, not that she was merely older, but innately different.

Of course, implications with beings who couldn't lie were dangerous things; they were after all the closest they could come to lying. They were the most powerful tools they had, the truth that wasn't a truth, the lie someone told themselves.

However, in this case, Tom was willing to believe the door had existed even before Harry Potter had. The door, in some shape or another, had always existed.

"Then what?" Harry asked in frustration, throwing her hands in the air.

Well, he supposed there was always the truth. "The girl-who-lived, of course."

As Obi-Wan Kenobi had once said, it was true from a certain point of view.

He smiled as she frowned, looking as if she was two seconds away from stomping her feet and throwing a shoe at his head. Ah, yes, somehow, he found he rather liked that expression.

They started walking again, in silence for a little while, then she asked, "What happens to you and the deer when we get back?"

"Well, I imagine we're sucked back inside your head," Tom said. He had no reason to think they wouldn't be, after all. This, whatever this magic was, hadn't truly severed the bond for either him or the deer. She frowned, looking pained.

"And you're… fine with that."

"Why wouldn't I be?" he asked in honest astonishment, and then, upon seeing her expression, he realized what she was getting at. "Oh, yes… Well, it's been sixteen years. The world has and will continue to turn without me. I really don't mind."

She didn't believe him; of course she didn't, and if he'd been any younger or any different, she'd have been right. Tom Riddle didn't do well inside of cages, but… Things had changed; he wasn't like the others. However, like many things, he wasn't about to tell her that.

Instead he smiled and said slowly, "Cheer up, Harry, and focus on that apparition."

* * *

 **Author's Note: Ah, the chapter that both clears things up and doesn't clear things up. Namely, Harry's a willfully overpowered idiot and brain roommate Tom's not sure he wants to open that can of worms.**

 **Thanks to GlassGirlCeci for betaing the chapter. Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	18. Chapter 18

_"_ _I love that you get cold when it's 71 degrees out. I love that it takes you an hour and a half to order a sandwich. I love that you get a little crinkle above your nose when you're looking at me like I'm nuts. I love that after I spend the day with you, I can still smell your perfume on my clothes. And I love that you are the last person I want to talk to before I go to sleep at night. And it's not because I'm lonely, and it's not because it's New Year's Eve. I came here tonight because when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _December, 1942_

* * *

"Come on, Harry, you can do this," Harry said to herself—no, that was wrong, she'd been saying this to herself since…

Well, it was hard to tell time in a place where time didn't seem to exist, but it felt like a god-awful long time to be giving yourself motivational speeches.

"You're trying too hard," the glowing version of Riddle said, walking alongside her stag as if he didn't have a care in the world, not even looking at her as Harry tried for what had to be the billionth time.

"How can I be trying too hard?!" Harry cried out in frustration, tearing at her hair. "If I was trying too hard wouldn't I at least be getting somewhere?"

Trying too hard had rarely been Harry's problem in anything. There was the Patronus, she supposed, but other than that Harry would fully admit that most of her problems in magic came down to being… well… lazy or else unprepared. In her defense, Voldemort was very distracting and evil. Harry didn't have time for Potions when Quirrell was sneaking about.

Well, that, and she'd accepted that Snape would fail her anyway even if she did try. After realizing that, it became a little difficult to motivate herself to put in that extra effort in Potions.

"You're overanalyzing it," he said. "Think less."

Thinking too much had also never been one of Harry's problems.

Finally, Riddle looked at her with those strange, colorless glowing eyes. "Think about the goal, the desire. Let the mechanics of it wash away until only the goal itself remains. All that matters is the destination. The fabric of time and space is nothing in comparison, and when you see it in your head, reach for it."

"Well, that's all very poetic and good," Harry responded blandly, "But it's really not helping. Are you sure this is the best way to learn Apparition?"

"For you," Riddle said, just as blandly in turn, though clearly amused by Harry's frustration, "Yes."

"For me?" Harry balked. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means that I've lived inside your head for over a decade, and if I didn't understand how you thought by now then I'd be an even sorrier excuse for a human being than I already am." He spared her a look that was purely Tom Riddle in nature, challenging eyebrows raised, a slight tilt to his head as he waited for her response. "If you can trust anything, Harry, trust that I know how you work."

Harry forced herself to look away, to stare and march ahead, and huffed, "Well, that's not creepy or anything."

Except it was more than creepy.

It was starting to dawn on her that he wasn't lying, that if he was… conscious in there, inside her head, then he really did know how she thought. He knew every thought she'd had probably before she'd even had it. He'd been there long before Hogwarts, before even the Dursleys, and seen every stumbling moment along the way.

Voldemort, or at least some aspect of him, understood her better than she likely understood herself.

That was terrifying.

He grew quiet again, realizing he'd said far too much, that if he hadn't pointed it out then Harry never would have put two and two together, and…

And it was terrifying how natural it was to just talk with him. Even when she was griping or moaning, they just fell into this natural sort of rhythm in their conversations. Like she was as familiar and, in a way, as comfortable with him as she was with Ron or Hermione. No, maybe even more so, because there were things she just couldn't say to Ron or Hermione.

With him, whenever she didn't think about it, it felt like nothing was off limits. Maybe because a part of her knew that he already knew everything anyway.

"Harry." His voice was softer this time, too soft, and she knew that if she dared to look, his expression would hold that same unnerving softness that went far beyond fondness. The kind of expression you could only give to someone you'd known your entire life. "You can trust that I will always be on your side."

She stopped dead in her tracks, something in her snapping, and she whipped back towards him. "What the hell are you talking about?!"

He stopped as well, and for the dozenth time he considered her, once again thinking through all he wanted to say and all he didn't and trying to craft a response that she'd expect. Except Harry wouldn't accept that, she wouldn't accept some calculated answer, some hint that he knew her better than she'd dared to even think before now.

"Don't stop and think about it!" Harry snapped. "Just tell me!"

"Alright," he said, crossing his arms. A small sardonic smile grew on his lips, as if he was throwing out whatever charming pretense he'd kept up and finally showing her what she'd wanted all along. "I live in your scar, Harry."

"I know you live in my scar," Harry said, rubbing at the scar in question, wishing not for the first time that she'd never had it and never had to deal with any of this. "We've been over this!"

Even if it was still sinking in, even if she was still desperately avoiding what happened after all of this, what it meant that he was inside her head and didn't even seem inclined to leave it…

"The point being, Harry, that I live inside you," he said, cutting off her thoughts without sympathy. "If something unpleasant happens to you, then, in effect, it happens to me. It's in my best interest to keep you out of Voldemort's way."

He motioned back to himself, smile growing wider. "So, Harry, I guarantee that whatever secrets I know about you, whatever small things make you tick, everything I've been through since 1981 will never leave your head. I will do everything in my power and more to protect us from whatever enemy comes your way. Whether that's Voldemort, Dumbledore, or—"

"Dumbledore?" Harry interjected, and he immediately fell silent, and it was hard to tell, given that the man was made of glowing white light, but she thought he paled somewhat. The light of his face grew dimmer, more ashen, and his eyes widened.

"Never mind," he said quickly, tugging her Patronus obediently forward once again. "That's not important, just—keep in mind that, even though I'm inside you, I haven't sold you out so far."

That wasn't the first time he'd brought up Dumbledore.

It hadn't been often, just a few comments here and there, but what he'd said… She wanted to say it was just because he was Tom Riddle, a memory of Voldemort, and Dumbledore had always been his enemy and even being stuck in Harry's head couldn't change that. Except, he didn't talk about Dumbledore the way Tom Riddle of 1942 did, or even Voldemort of 1996. He talked about Dumbledore like he was more of a threat to Harry herself, somehow, than he was to Tom.

Like he'd been a threat to Harry for a long time now.

Of course, maybe that was his grand goal, to position Harry against Dumbledore. He had to know that wouldn't work though, Harry would far more readily trust Dumbledore than she did any incarnation of Tom Riddle, especially the version that gave her migraines. He wouldn't bother with something that obvious, probably wouldn't bother at all, except he also kept bringing it up then disregarding it completely.

No, no, this was future Harry's problem. She didn't have the time or the energy for this, she had places to be. It didn't have to be 1996, she'd settle for 1942...mostly she'd settle for anywhere but here.

No, she realized as her eyes unwillingly slid to her companion. If he really did go back inside her head then she had to go back to 1942. How could she show up, back in the future, knowing that the thing in her head that connected her to Voldemort was at least partially conscious? What if he really was like Voldemort? Then she couldn't possibly take him back and unleash him on her friends.

Not right after she'd nearly gotten them killed.

She couldn't go back until she knew exactly what he wanted, intended, and what she could do about it.

Harry…

She wasn't going home after all.

"Think of the destination," she forced herself to say, blocking everything else out, and only thinking of Hogwarts …

No, that wasn't right, she was thinking of the ideal Hogwarts. The memory of it during the Christmas holidays. She could see herself and Ron, that first year, when for the first time in her life there had been presents waiting there for Harry, her father's cloak among them. The glow of that Christmas would always be with her, somewhere in the back of her head, lighting her way forward.

This Christmas would never be like that, couldn't be; after all, she'd be settling for the holidays with Tom Riddle. Except suddenly, somehow, she found herself missing him. With the future out of reach, pushed to the side, he and Alphard Black were somehow all she had here. They were her world, for better or worse, and for all that he was, there were so many moments where he surprised her. She missed his biting wit and insults, his sudden devil-may-care attitude, his mercurial highs and lows, and his odd heartfelt moments that came entirely out of left field. It wasn't home, but for now, god she'd take it.

She'd take the Christmas she never should have been invited to.

And it didn't matter, for the moment, that he was still Tom Riddle and the reason she couldn't go home was because of another goddamn Tom Riddle she hadn't even known existed. It didn't matter that she still didn't trust him as far as she could throw him, that the only reasons she didn't have to watch her back were his weird Unbreakable Vow and the death of the basilisk. It didn't even matter that it would be little more than a ghost of Christmas, an echo of holidays spent with Ron, Hermione, and the Weasleys.

It was still better than this place.

Worse, somehow the idea that she'd have neither 1942 nor 1996 was utterly unbearable. You'd think it'd be a plus, because at least she'd be back to only one Tom Riddle, an unknown Tom Riddle, but all the same…

"Do you think it will be Christmas when we get back?" she asked.

"It's hard to say," he demurred, then, glancing at her, he said, "I think that, sometimes, if you want it hard enough the universe may work in your favor."

She laughed. "When has that ever happened?"

He smiled in turn, his lips twitching with the effort of restraining and hiding it from her, but he lost the battle and it only grew. "Half of magic is raw determination and human will. If you want it, then we could land in the summer of 1996."

1996\. She wanted to laugh at the idea that he hadn't put it together yet. That he was either too polite, too smart, or just too oblivious to point out that Harry knew they couldn't go back yet, not like this.

"Or I guess we could just put off thinking about it until we actually cross that bridge," Harry said instead, trying to hide the bitterness in her voice, probably failing from the look he gave her.

Still, he didn't say anything about it, didn't make some snide cutting remark she didn't need to hear, only, "That too."

They fell into silence and Harry let her thoughts overtake her.

She could try and kill him, she supposed, in a way that she'd never tried to kill any Tom Riddle before. It'd always been about escaping Voldemort, just living through the encounter, but if she wanted to be really sure she could…

Except how do you kill a ghost? How do you kill something that lives in your head and only shows up when you're stuck between worlds? More, did she really want to kill someone who hadn't done anything to her so far? Just because he might be like the rest of Tom Riddle?

Did she want to become a person capable of even thinking about it?

No, even if it took longer, even if it took years now, she'd go home and she'd either get him out of her head or take him back with the ability to take him at his word. She'd have to be able to trust him more than she trusted herself, just like he knew her better than she knew herself, and until then…

Until then, this would be Harry's world.

He suddenly stopped, and without a word he grabbed her by her collar and hauled her up onto the stag. He followed closely behind, practically landing on top of her, and dug his heels in and forced the deer forward.

Harry looked behind them and immediately blanched. "Shit!"

It seemed as if they hadn't seen them in days, but it looked seemed the hunt was still on. The king and his party, dark horses and pale riders, bled out of the trees and towards them, knocking and loosing arrows in fluid, graceful movements even while riding.

Harry's eyes widened, and she barely ducked in time as one went whizzing past where her head had been.

"They're shooting at us now?!" Harry asked.

"They know this wouldn't kill you," Tom said, leaning forward and urging the deer to rapidly turn, to try and dodge the arrows.

Harry's mouth fell open. "I kind of think an arrow through my brain would do the trick!"

He said nothing, instead pushing her down, out of the way of yet another whizzing arrow. Right, not the time. Harry, pulling her wand out of her robes, peered around glowing Tom Riddle, and tried to catch sight of her pursuers.

Honestly, what had she done to deserve this?

Had she murdered the Dalai Lama in a past life?

" _Expelliarmus!_ " she shouted, botching half the wand movements, but good enough to get the bolt of light out and knock the bow out of the hands of one of the faceless men.

"Harry!"

Harry looked up just in time to see another arrow coming for her, this one unavoidable. She only had a second, a second to blink and open her mouth, a second to raise her wand and cast a shield, but in that second something else happened.

In the end, it was always Harry on her own. Hermione and Ron, for whatever reason, were never there at the end of the day. It wasn't their fault and she never blamed them, because they shouldn't have to be there either. The fact was, though, that at the end of the day Harry could only rely on Harry.

Dumbledore was always out of the castle, Ron held up by a chess game gone wrong, and Hermione held back by the lack of a potion to let her through the fire too.

She was so used to taking care of herself, of having to save not only herself but everyone else, that it never occurred to her that someone could beat her to it.

That an arrow might miss her because Tom Riddle made it hit him instead.

He gave out a great cry and slumped forward, starting to convulse. Pale light seeped out of him like blood against the dark arrow, and he began to slip off the stag.

" _Accio!_ " Harry cried, unthinking, and nearly falling off herself as he flew into her arms. She gripped him tightly, ignoring the arrow sticking out of his back, and squeezed her eyes shut.

The destination, all she had to do was think of the destination, think of Hogwarts.

That was all she had to do.

She forced all her power, all her will, into that thought and could do nothing more than scream as the endless twilight, her pursuers, and the woods without end disappeared.

* * *

The morning after Tom realized that he was likely sexually attracted to his cousin-if-not-sister, the mysterious Harry Evans, he still found it impossible to focus on anything but the fact that he was sexually attracted to his cousin-if-not-sister.

Think about legilimency? Harry Evans was probably his sister.

Go back to the family archives and try to hunt down Marvolo? He'd just be that much closer to finding Harry Evans' name on a branch right across from him.

Try to find a way to outwit the mortal coil and plan what Voldemort would look like now that he'd gone and thoroughly botched up his Hogwarts reputation? Harry Evans was his goddamn sister.

This was terrible.

He was useless.

He couldn't even eat toast without coming back to that thought, it had honestly given him nightmares, and at the rate he was going he'd keep having these bloody nightmares until she showed back up out of the ether next—

It wasn't a crash. That wasn't the right word, but it somehow felt or sounded like the shattering of glass even though that wasn't the sound at all. It was as if his brain, somehow, had associated the noise or feeling in the air with the closest equivalent, something breaking.

He looked up and had to shield his eyes. There was a great tear in the air right above the Slytherin table, blinding white light pouring through, and in the middle of it shapes were beginning to form. Slowly, as the tear closed, the figure of a white stag came into view, a fantastical bow, quiver, and sword strapped to it with thick leather bands. Then, riding on top of it, what looked like the glowing figure of a man, and clutching him…

"Harry?!" Tom blurted.

Of course it was her, who else would it be? Still, at the same time it was like he was looking at her for the first time. She looked like she had in the Chamber of Secrets, washed out and streaked with dirt, clearly on the other side of some battle Tom hadn't seen.

However, there was no Hogwarts uniform now; her clothes were pragmatic and unsurprisingly a touch masculine (her skirt had been replaced with a pair of trousers) Her hair was pulled back, but very loosely, strands of it curling in all directions, and on her head rested a crown of holly leaves and berries like the crown of a king. Riding in on… God, was that a solid version of her patronus?

Outside of her Hogwarts uniform she looked…

He didn't know, only that it made it all the clearer that there were worlds she lived in that he couldn't touch.

The stag touched down on the table, translucent hooves shattering breakfast plates even amid the students screaming and staff members raising their wands. She didn't move though, instead holding the glowing figure in her arms closer, shielding him from view.

She said something, not to Tom, not to the Great Hall which she didn't even seem to see, but instead to the man. He couldn't make it out. Moving closer, he tried to read it off her lips.

Was it "Why did you do it?" followed by "How do I help you?"

The man didn't answer, only moved ever so slightly, a pale hand reaching up towards her face. Just before he made contact, he and the stag, these strange solid patronuses she'd brought with her, disappeared back into flecks of white light.

Gracelessly, Harry fell onto the Slytherin table, straight on her back, hair landing in the butter on Tom's plate, staring in dull shock up at the ceiling of the Great Hall.

Tom, looking down at what had been his breakfast and was now Harry Evans' face, felt he had full right to exclaim, "Harry, what the hell?!"

"Hi Tom," she responded blandly, no emotion in her voice, then after a beat, still with no emotion, "My friends sucked."

Tom opened his mouth, closed it, but by this point the staff had actually arrived at the near-empty Slytherin table. The holidays had always been depressing at Hogwarts. Even when he'd first started, he'd been the only one in Slytherin to stay behind. His first few years he'd been the only one in the whole bloody school.

As the war had progressed, as the Germans had started bombing London and hardly seemed to stop, nearly every muggleborn had joined him, seeking shelter in Scotland away from the Blitz. Warren's family and the others, however, had made plans for their children to evacuate the city during the summer.

Tom, after pleading with Dippet to please just let him stay—to let him work for his keep over the summer, anything to avoid London—had been forced to write desperately to Mrs. Cole, praying that they hadn't already evacuated, to find anywhere he could possibly go.

Finding them had been a miracle and a half, one unappreciated by Mrs. Cole, the other orphans, or Tom himself, but he'd done it. He'd managed it even after sitting on the Hogwarts Express, seething, as he thought how the blasted train was dutifully carrying him from Scotland back to a city on fire because that bastard Dippet couldn't make an exception. England could be invaded by U-boats, and they'd still send him back to London with a cheery little wave.

That might have been the moment, standing in Dippet's office being told he was going back to London, that Voldemort became more than an idle dream.

Regardless, he was the only mudblood in Slytherin besides Evans, and so the only one who had stayed behind. At other nearly empty tables were Moaning Myrtle and a few choice muggleborn others, kept out of harm's way in case the Germans decided one Blitz wasn't enough.

And now joined by Harry Evans, teleporting through Hogwarts' wards, riding her own Patronus with a wand in one hand and a sword in the other, the most mismatched Valkyrie there'd ever been.

"Miss Evans?" Dumbledore asked, wand lowering slightly as he leaned over her, recognizing that even as she'd gotten through the wards she was at least a student. Still, Tom could almost read his mind as he looked towards the air above Harry's head: If she could get through, what was stopping someone like Grindelwald?

Harry grunted and slowly sat up, taking her sword, bow, and arrows with her, moving like every muscle ached and her bruises had bruises on them. Then, looking across at the staff, she raised a hand and waved. "Hello, sorry. About dinner, I mean."

"Breakfast," Tom thoughtlessly corrected, feeling in shock himself.

"Breakfast," Harry parroted, wiping her nose with one sleeve, looking like anything but someone capable of Apparating into Hogwarts.

"Miss Evans"—this was Dippet, moving forward with a strained smile, the kind of smile you gave when you had no idea what you should do except pretend you had some kind of control over the situation—"I'm sorry, but, you see, we need to know how you got through Hogwarts wards."

She looked at him blankly, blinking once, then twice. "Oh, right, those things. Right, there were wards, that's why there was that portkey in the tournament…"

"Miss Evans?" Dippet pressed, "Please, for the safety of Hogwarts."

"I don't know," Harry said quickly, and then, with a look of dawning realization spreading on her face, "I… I must have wanted it enough."

She looked up, biting her lip, emotion returning to her face and movements again. She pushed forward off the table, making to part them and move through, "Sorry, there's something I have to do—"

"Miss Evans," Dumbledore interrupted forcefully, tearing his gaze away from the space where she'd appeared, "You can't brush this off. Please, we need to know."

"I'm sorry," she repeated, pausing, halfway on the table and half off of it. "But I really don't—"

"My dear girl, you must have some idea," Slughorn cut in, appraising her with a new wary and yet greedy glint in his eye. "This school's defenses, after all, have never been penetrated before. That's not something that simply happens."

She huffed out a laugh. "Well, I guess it happens today. Look, later, I'll tell you everything later, anything you want to know, though I really have no idea what happened, but I—"

"Miss Evans," Dumbledore said. "This can't wait until later."

That seemed to do it. Something about those words, the way he said them, or perhaps even that it was Dumbledore saying them, seemed to shake her out of her hurried apologies and desperation. She looked directly at him, her eyes cold, eyebrows lowering, and when she spoke her voice was louder and rougher than before. "Look, I don't know. I never know!"

She pushed herself off the table, pointed a finger towards the man, and with a manic grin asked, "Why don't you figure out and tell me? Or don't, just like you never tell me anything else!"

Tom looked up and saw the banners for the different houses waving in a sudden rising wind. Looking down at the table, Tom noticed that the glass was shaking, vibrating, and just on the edge of shattering.

"Hey, here's an idea, professor, how about I don't tell you, just like you never tell me?! Figure it out for yourself and see where it gets you!"

She looked over at the others then, at Tom, as if only just remembering that they were there as well. As if, for a moment, Harry had been somewhere else entirely. Shaking her head, she started walking, apologizing as she went. "Tomorrow, I'm sorry, I'll talk tomorrow. Just—not now, please, I'm sorry—"

She continued on the way out the door, apologizing to no one and everyone as she went, leaving the staff and the students to look towards the only one in the room who could hope to understand her. Tom Riddle awkwardly smiled back at them, standing up and abandoning the very idea of breakfast. "I'm sorry, I'll find out what happened, and I'll bring her back."

Probably not until tomorrow (because when had he ever managed to talk Harry Evans into or out of anything?), but it was what they needed to hear. Dumbledore turned away from him dismissively, instead staring ahead at nothing, at the wards invisible to the eye. Dippet, however, nodded gratefully. "Thank you, Tom. I don't know what we'd do without you."

Oh, Tom thought bitterly, somehow, he thought they'd get by.

Tom just nodded and strode out the doors after her, trying not to listen as the staff began to murmur amongst themselves, Slughorn's amazed words loudest of all, "Even Merlin, they say—"

When he was out the door, standing just outside the Great Hall, he couldn't help but repeat the words to himself, "Even Merlin."

"She just couldn't keep it between us," Tom asked himself with a smile, "Could she?"

Her victory over the basilisk, the fact that she was more than she seemed… It'd been for them, a secret between them, and he hadn't realized that for all he resented that, it'd also meant that he had something no one else had. He'd seen her for what she truly was, just as she'd seen him, and that had meant more than something.

More than even the horrifying idea that they shared blood along with everything else.

Now everyone would have a part of Harry Evans.

He shook his head, turning down the hallway, keeping his eyes peeled. He almost missed her, sitting on the floor, back to the wall and staring out dully into the empty hallway.

He stopped just in front of her, looking down at the crown that suited her entirely too well. God, he thought with a smile, she was a prince on a white horse, wasn't she? She was everything Tom had aspired to present to the world, the grand façade he'd wanted, and even more than that. Her noble steed might be a stag, she might be saving men of light instead of maidens in towers, but how had it taken him so long to see it?

"Harry."

She frowned, a desperate twisting of lips that were biting down on a sob, and she shook her head.

He crouched down, balancing on the balls of his feet across from her, closing the gap between them even that much.

"Harry," he repeated.

"Sorry," she finally said, "I've just… I just had a rough past few days. It has been days, right? Kind of lost track of time."

"It's not Christmas yet, if that's what you mean. You only took the train a few days ago," Tom said slowly, a feeling of dread spreading through him, that somehow Harry had lost that much track of time.

What had she been doing?

She laughed, head lolling against the wall. "Oh, man, he was right. I wanted Christmas, even here and—He really was right, all I had to do was want it."

"He?"

"It doesn't matter," Harry said quickly, too quickly. "I—Do you ever have the feeling that you think you know someone, or at least you see them well enough, and then they do something they're never supposed to do?"

"Harry, you just Apparated directly into Hogwarts," Tom said blandly, then nodded to her new weapons. "Apparted in riding your Patronus, carrying a sword and bow which look like they were made three centuries ago, and that's not even getting to your glowing friend."

She smiled, shaking her head. "Look, I can't—I mean, can we just go back to the common room for a while? Just… Let's not do this, any of this, today. That's Future Harry's problem, alright?"

She looked up at him so hopefully, and it struck him that she really meant it this time. For the first time, she was trusting him to do anything at all. He could ask her about her family, ask if she visited them, ask how closely they were related and if she truly spoke Parseltongue. He could, but he'd be throwing this moment away.

As Harry said, that was for Future Tom.

So he took her hand, helped pull her to her feet, and guided her back to the dungeons. "Sure, Harry, we can wait as long as you want. I'll keep them off your back, it's what I'm good for."

He knew that his politicking and brown nosing, even after his fall from grace, would be good for something.

* * *

Even injured, insofar as something like him could be injured, he could tell when it happened. One moment she, the inward projection of Harry, had been staring out past him with his hand in a death grip, and the next she was looking him in the eye and fully aware of where she was and who she was staring at.

Without thinking, she threw herself at him, squeezing him and the wound in his back far too tightly.

"Gently!" he cautioned, but as usual, she didn't hear a word of it.

He had to pry himself out forcefully, force her back so he could look her in the eye, and chided with a great sigh, "Harry, please."

She didn't apologize, didn't backtrack, just looked at him in wonder as if she'd never seen him before. "You're alright, you're here, you're—"

She trailed off, looked away from him to their surroundings, their unfortunately familiar surroundings. "In Number 4 Privet Drive."

"Whenever you're… particularly unhappy," Tom said, letting his eyes wander over their surroundings, Dudley's second bedroom with its bars on the windows, "We always wind up back here."

The worst, of course, was when they ended up back in the cupboard.

At her confused look, he elaborated, "Welcome to your own mind, Harry."

"I thought it'd be…" she trailed off, searching for the right word where none could exist.

"Taller?" he filled in for her, but she laughed, smiled even after the joke had died off.

"So, has this happened before?" Harry asked, brushing her hair back away from her face.

"I don't think you've ever wanted to talk before," Tom mused. At least, not as far as he could tell. Harry, the conscious Harry, had wanted to run as far from him as she possibly could, so of course she wouldn't seek out the memory of Tom Riddle in her head.

"Maybe I dreamed it before," she said slowly, looking at her surroundings again, "I'm dreaming now, you know."

"I know," he said, but she didn't seem to hear it.

"Riddle, the other Riddle, walked me back to the dorm and barred the door against Slughorn, Dippet, and Dumbledore… I think I passed out on his bed, in the prefect room. He has his own room, you know. I didn't think about it, I guess, I just—"

"I'm not just dreaming this," she said, looking at him closely, "Right?"

He brushed hair back behind her ear, smiling. "It would take more than that to get rid of me, Harry. I'm afraid you and I are stuck together for a while yet."

She smiled first, then tried to frown as she reminded herself of what that meant, but in the end settled on smiling again. "God, why does that make me feel relieved?"

"Because you're Harry Potter," he said, "And you're the kind to self-flagellate over pain that you didn't even cause, and to even the most unrepentant of monsters. You're relieved, Harry, because as always you secretly want to save the world."

She shook this off, finally backed away to sit cross legged across from him on the bed, unconsciously mirroring his other, more real half earlier in the day. "I don't know about that. Right now I just kind of want to pass Hogwarts, and maybe get the staff off my back."

"Well, Harry," he couldn't help but remark drily, "It's not like you just tore through Hogwarts centuries-strong wards."

The unconscious shrug, unfortunately, caused his back to twinge and the wound to flare up again. Harry's eyes flew to his but he waved off her concern. "It's fine, just give it time, this is nothing."

A round with Voldemort's wrath, with any of Harry's visions, or hell, even going toe to toe with Snape in those occlumency lessons, had been worse than this. This would be gone before either of them knew it.

"Hey," she said, looking at him closely, resting her arms against her legs, "Why'd you do it?"

"Do what?" he asked, trying to readjust into a comfortable position against the wall, propping her now bloodstained pillow behind him.

"The arrow," she said, "You took it for me."

Then, after a pause, looking at his chest, where a little to the left and down the arrow might have pierced his heart through his back, "You could have died."

"I doubt that," he said. Horcruxes, after all, weren't so easily disposed of. Though with whatever ancient magic the fair folk used, if it had hit his heart… Then, perhaps, he might have disappeared from this world.

Strange, he hadn't thought about that at the time.

"Just the same," he said slowly, "Harry, your life is worth so much more than mine. Of course I took it for you."

He motioned to himself with his good hand. "Look at me, Harry."

"I'm a memory of a man who outlived his time," he said, as he summarized Tom Riddle in a single grand motion. Then he motioned to her. "But you, Harry, you have so much potential. Not just for greatness, for glory, but for doing good in this cruel world we live in. You have so much left to achieve, so many places you can go, memories to make. I can't allow that to be snuffed out when you still have the future to chase after."

She opened her mouth, closed it, then opened it again. Finally, after swallowing, she pointed to him and accused, "You're a Gryffindor."

"What?" he asked, "No, no, I'm just… Well, I don't know, I suppose clear-sighted, for the first time in my life."

After all, the Tom Riddle currently out there in the real world, however true it was, was not yet ready to admit that Harry Potter was worth ten of him and then some.

"Sure," Harry drawled, clearly not believing a word of it, and he supposed it did sound painfully self-sacrificing. After all, if he was that self-sacrificing, he might have told the truth to her face.

That he was a horcrux and because of him, because of her, Voldemort would never die.

Taking an arrow that was unlikely to kill him, that was nothing.

"Still," Harry said, breathing out a deep sigh of relief, "I owe you one. God, do I owe you a life debt?"

He laughed, a full-throated thing that hurt his back something awful, but he laughed all the same. "Good god, no, no Harry, you don't owe me shit."

"Good," Harry said, "I really didn't want to owe you anything."

He paused, looked at her, and then noted, "I am sorry. That it didn't work out."

"What?"

"1996," he said, "I can't help but notice we're still in 1942."

"Oh," she said, then her eyes widened. "Oh, right, that… It… You know, it totally slipped my mind."

There was something there, something her subconscious had been muttering about earlier, squirrelling away and hiding from his view. However, he didn't have the energy to pick at it. She'd tell him eventually.

For now, he'd let her keep her secrets.

"You know, I was thinking." She paused, looking at him again. "I was thinking that I'd take a break for a few weeks. From the time travelling business, I mean. Instead, I don't know, maybe you can help me with my OWLs and Potions—"

By help, he had a feeling Harry meant cheat.

If Harry had known, from the age of eleven, that she had Tom Riddle living in her brain, she would have been pumping him for answers to all her essays and tests years ago.

It was also sad that he couldn't really bring himself to care.

"—Just, you know, in case things don't work out."

The point was that this was an olive branch, more of an olive branch than he'd ever expected. "I'd like that."

Her smile, as always, was a winning thing that had in the past always overshadowed her comically large glasses. True, her eyes had always been noteworthy, but he thought her smile was particularly underrated.

Then it disappeared, dimmed, and with a pensive expression she asked, "Why couldn't you have been like this in the real world?"

What could he possibly say to that? What should he say to that? That he was only a fragment of Tom Riddle? That he, likely, was that small sliver of humanity that had survived so many purgings of Tom Riddle's soul?

"Well," he said, "I suppose that I'm older, more experienced, and more removed from the world and situation. I can sit back, reflect. The others… They can't or else choose not to."

Then, he said perhaps the most damning truth of all. "More, I think, I met you."

* * *

 **Author's Note: So many feelings. But oh, look, a Hogwarts appears.**

 **Thanks to GlassGirlCeci for betaing the chapter. Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Dislcaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	19. Chapter 19

" _Everybody thinks they have good taste and a sense of humor but they couldn't possibly all have good taste."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _December, 1942_

* * *

She wasn't where she was supposed to be.

That was her first thought when her eyes opened.

This wasn't her bed. It wasn't the Gryffindor bed, Number 4 Privet Drive's worn down mattress, the Burrow's extra bedroom, Grimmuald Place's, or even her Slytherin bed that she was just starting to get used to. This was a new bed, Harry didn't know this bed, which meant it was a very bad thing that Harry was waking up in this bed.

Worse was, on turning her head, she found her face inches from a sleeping Tom Riddle's.

His eyes flew open the second she started screaming, shrieking like she'd just found Scabbers staring at her in the shower, and he let out a substantial "oof" as she shoved him off the bed and onto the floor.

Harry flew out of bed, crashed into the wall, and immediately whipped her wand out of her pocket and aimed it at her unwelcome guest.

Tom, slowly, poked his head up from the other side of the bed. His hands were raised, wandless, in a sign of surrender, "Do you do this every morning?"

Slowly, heart racing, Harry remembered where she was. She was back in Hogwarts, had escaped fairy land relatively intact and ended up on the Slytherin table in the great hall, she'd blown off the staff, Tom had taken her back to his own private bedroom, and then she'd commandeered his bed and had a little nap-chat with the other Tom Riddle that lived in her head.

Which meant that she'd just woken up in Tom Riddle's room, it was his bed, and she had maybe overreacted a bit.

"Sorry," she said sheepishly, stuffing her wand back into her pocket, "I sort of forgot where I was for a second there."

"Really?" Tom asked as he picked himself up off the floor, with a look that implied he desperately wished he was crass enough to say, 'no shit'.

They stared at each other awkwardly.

He looked… God, but he really did look like his older self. He was a bit shorter, maybe a bit thinner and lankier, not yet having grown into his frame but all the pieces of the older Tom Riddle were there. He had none of the typical growing pains of most of Harry's Hogwarts peers, like he only needed the slightest knob turned and puberty would be done, leaving him slightly taller and more handsome than he was now.

He even made being kicked out of his own bed at god only knew what time in the morning with his hair skewed and eyes framed by dark sleepless circles look good. Even in pajamas, a long-sleeved shirt with a matching pair of blue trousers, which by all rights would make anyone else look like a total nerd, he looked good. He could make a paper sack look good.

Harry was certain that she looked like garbage. For one thing, she was in the same clothes she'd been wearing for the past god knew how many days, she also hadn't had a shower since even before that, and she was still covered in mystical forest and had gotten all that in Tom Riddle's bed without thinking about it. She was also Harry Potter, which meant on any given day her hair was the size of Dolly Parton's with none of the style, her skin looked like it'd never seen a ray of sunlight, and she had the figure of a stretched out twelve-year-old boy.

Tom cleared his throat, and Harry suddenly realized she'd just been looking at him way too long, and pointedly stared at somewhere above his head.

"Thanks, you know, for yesterday," Harry said stiffly, her eyes darted to his face and at his lack of response clarified, "With the staff, I mean, and getting me back here. I… Well, I'm not sure I would have made it on my own."

She'd been so tired. It was like apparition had sucked all the energy out of her, and between that and the idea that the Tom in her head had just died in her arms without her ever knowing why… It'd taken all she'd had just to lean on Tom Riddle and follow him back here.

"You looked like you needed it," he said, rubbing a hand exhaustedly through his hair, "You slept the whole day."

"I slept the whole—" Harry glanced out towards his window, which of course was useless since Slytherin was down in the dungeons, and then shifted her head to look at Tom's clock on the night stand.

Shit, it was breakfast, she really had slept the whole goddamn day.

With a sigh he sat down on the bed, rubbing at his eyes in exhaustion, and not looking like he was moving anywhere any time soon.

"Are you alright?" Harry blurted, the words just tumbling out of her mouth.

He glanced up, nodded, "Yes, I'm just… tired. I haven't been getting much sleep recently."

What did he have to lose sleep over? Then Harry blanched, remembered where she was, and had the weird thought that she was technically imposing on Tom Riddle's space rather than the other way around.

"Right, sorry, I'll give you some space to change and—"

He stopped her, shaking his head, "Harry, please, don't—" he took a breath and then more firmly asked, "Can we just talk?"

Harry frowned, glanced at the clock, they still had plenty of time for breakfast and she really did need to eat something soon. That said, he looked serious, and maybe Harry owed him enough to just talk to him. Besides, they probably should talk, so much had come up between them…

She could remind him that maybe he really did want to be king of Slytherin, well, or figure out if she wanted to remind him. If she wasn't going back to the future anyway, if that road was blocked to her, then she never wanted him going back to what he was.

She could find out what he knew about her, what he'd figured out, and what he thought she was if it wasn't Harry Evans.

Slowly, Harry sat down on the bed right next to him.

He didn't say anything, just stared at her for a moment, his expression curiously bare. It wasn't expressionless it was just… There was no effort in it, it was the face of someone who had just woken up in the morning, who'd been spending a long time thinking about something and not liking it, but there was nothing besides that. It was natural on him.

"Are we talking?" Harry finally asked, and he just nodded.

"Where were you really over the holidays, Harry?" he asked and she sucked in a breath, she'd hoped he would just let that one go. But… She could admit, that if she was Tom, and she had the mystery of Harry Potter dangling in front of her face for months, she would have been so much worse.

Harry had made it her life's work to solve mysteries she had no business being involved in. She couldn't really blame Tom Riddle for being at least slightly similar, even if it would have made things easier.

"I wasn't visiting friends," Harry said quietly, not looking at him, "You're right, I don't really have friends here. I—There was this thing I had to do; it didn't pan out."

That was putting it mildly.

If Harry wanted to be optimistic, she'd say that at least she learned something. She learned that she was the spy, that Voldemort was in her head, except that he wasn't Voldemort. Even if some of it was a show, even if he believed he wouldn't die or have been hurt, Voldemort would never have risked himself like that for her.

Some strange derivative of Tom Riddle was inside her head and she was further away from 1996 than she'd ever been before.

She still wasn't sure why she was relieved that he, it, was still alive. She wasn't even sure if it hadn't just been a dream prompted by Harry's suicidal desire to see the parasite in her head keep living. She could go ahead and blame the saving people thing, she always did, but the fact was that she was relieved and even if she could she didn't think she could kill him herself.

She couldn't even stand to watch him die.

Except that meant everything had to change because something had to be done about Tom Riddle.

On Harry's giant list of priorities, dealing with brain-Tom had just moved up to number one, displacing both time travel to 1996 and dealing with baby-Tom from 1942. Until she could sort out what he wanted, what he knew, and what he could do about anything she couldn't risk returning to the future. In the worst case scenario she would be putting information directly into Voldemort's hands, more than she already had, and would be placing the entire Order and her friends in danger.

She had to know that would never happen.

She would have to trust him not only more than she already trusted 1942's Tom Riddle, which was more than she thought she could trust any Tom Riddle, but more than even Ron and Hermione.

She'd have to know he'd never turn on her, never think of betraying her or even leaving Harry behind, no matter what she did to him. There couldn't be a firebolt incident with him, no Triwizard Tournament turnabout, they would have to be on the exact same page every single step of the way.

This wasn't a 'do I trust you not to kill me if I stop to window shop' but 'can I trust you with every sliver of myself and every hard decision we have to make along the way'.

She'd have to trust him more than she trusted herself.

And if, like any reasonable person, she couldn't, that meant truly abandoning her friends and the Order in the Department of Mysteries or else writing them thoughtlessly out of existence if she hadn't done that already. Their blood would finally sink into Harry's skin, unable to ever be washed off even by the miracle of impossible time travel.

Maybe that's how it should be, she thought dully. If she hadn't been sucked back in time that's how it would have been, the consequences of Harry's stupidity. She'd just hoped that somehow, like always, she'd wriggle her way out of the worst of it. They'd get out and laugh it off afterwards, a life-threatening adventure like all the others. But even cats only have nine lives and maybe Harry should recognize that there wasn't a way out this time.

Except, maybe Harry didn't have to trust him that much. Maybe, if she could trust that he really did have no interest in being Voldemort, that he was just a reclusive nerd who'd go hole up in a library somewhere, she could shove him into his own body. She'd take him back to the future, dump him into the body, and they'd merrily part ways.

She'd still have to trust him, a hell of a lot, as she'd be essentially resurrecting Tom Riddle again, but—

"Harry?"

Harry looked up, suddenly remembered she was talking to the other Tom Riddle, and quickly smiled, "Right, well, it was a bloody awful time and I'm honestly glad to be back."

"Right," he said slowly and then, hesitating for a moment, he asked, "And the wards?"

Oh, right, those things. She groaned, suddenly realizing that she was going to spend the rest of her life explaining those. She had to give Dumbledore credit, he never asked how she pulled off the shit she did (he usually had an explanation even), and she'd never realized how much she'd miss that.

"I don't know," she moaned and at Tom's unimpressed look added, "Really, I'm serious, I just… I wanted it."

"You wanted it," he parroted, "Harry, magic doesn't work like that."

Ironic, considering that a different Tom Riddle had insisted to a dubious Harry that this was exactly how magic worked.

"Well, half of magic is raw human will, you know," she said, paraphrasing the glowing Tom Riddle, and she couldn't help but smile when she realized that the look Tom Riddle was giving her was probably the one she'd given the other Tom Riddle.

"Look, I don't know," Harry said again, throwing her hands in the air, "Maybe it was the power of true love!"

That seemed to be Dumbledore's explanation for every other time Harry managed something mind-blowingly weird. She hadn't even questioned it until other Tom Riddle pointed out that love didn't typically melt faces.

"Go back to your first explanation," Tom said drily, "It was better."

For a moment they smiled at each other before his expression became serious again, "Seriously though, Harry, you better think of something quickly. I bought you a day, I can't buy any more, and the power of love will not keep Dumbledore off you back long."

Was this secret irony day? She knew Tom didn't know, couldn't know, but she was so tempted to open her mouth and note that the 'power of love' was straight from Dumbledore himself. Like it was all fine and good when Dumbledore said it but if anyone else said it to him, forget it.

Harry figured they were done and made to stand but Tom held her back.

"Harry," he said quietly, "I know you have no reason to talk to me about this, that you have made every effort to hide it from me but… Harry, I've been researching my family."

He said that like he'd just admitted to murdering her parents. Harry blinked once, twice, but the seriousness of his expression didn't change. His eyes were burning, like he was daring her to challenge him, and it'd all be very intimidating if he wasn't wearing pajamas.

"Okay?" Harry finally asked, when it was clear he expected something from her.

The look didn't fade.

Alright then, Tom Riddle's family, Voldemort's family… She knew jack shit about his family. She hadn't assumed there was anything to know, had been told unhappy orphan and had been pretty content with that. More, he hadn't seemed like something that could have family, a lineage, like he just sprung up from nothing. The answer to a non-existent riddle.

Well, as heir of Slytherin that meant he was somehow related to Slytherin, that could be important. Well, unless he also had a parselmouth in his head somewhere. Except, no, then Harry couldn't have gotten it from him, or at least she didn't think she could.

Why were they talking about this?

"Why are we talking about this?" Harry finally asked in defeat.

His eyes practically fell out of his head, his mouth dropped open, and whatever he'd been expecting her to say or do that hadn't been it.

He dumbly repeated, "My family, Harry."

"Yeah," Harry said, nodding slowly, "You said that. I mean, good for you, mate, tracking them down and all that."

If Harry hadn't known, for sure, who her parents were and that they were very dead she probably would have done the same. Probably would have done it sooner, honestly, sixteen seemed a little late to the game.

"Your family, Harry!" he shouted as if he couldn't take it anymore, like the words just exploded out of him.

Harry blinked, pointed to herself in confusion, "My family?"

Tom swallowed, eyes still wide, and quietly said, "Our family."

What was this? What was he even talking about? Was Harry still trapped in some alternate fairy dimension or something?

Tom then stood, marched over to his wardrobe without looking at her, and began pulling out a warm sweater and pair of trousers, "Never mind, you're right, I should dressed. You should get dressed. I'll see you down at breakfast."

Harry opened her mouth, about to ask what he was on about, what the hell they were even talking about but when he started taking off his shirt she realized that she'd been dismissed five seconds ago. She was not going to stay for when he dropped the pants.

"Right, breakfast, leaving," Harry said, blushing furiously as she practically sprinted out of the room, wondering when Tom Riddle had lost all sense of shame.

Lord, that boy did not deserve to be so good looking.

Thankfully, most of her clothing she'd left at Hogwarts for the holidays, so she actually did have something to change into. And this was the perfect opportunity for that shower.

Still, she thought as she wandered through the empty common room back to the fifth year girl's dorm, what she wouldn't give to know what he was thinking. He had to know that half the time he sounded completely insane.

Maybe she could ask the Tom in her brain, he had to have some insight into what his younger self was on about. If anyone knew Tom Riddle then it had to be Tom Riddle, right?

Suddenly, she just realized what she'd thought. She actually wanted to make contact, prolonged contact, with the Tom Riddle in her head. Except, why not? If she really did want to go back to the future, eventually, then she had to know if she could trust him. To do that she'd have to get to know him really well, as well as he knew her. She couldn't do that if she could only talk to him when passed out or wandering underground.

She had to find some way to get into contact with him when she wanted to which meant…

"Oh no," Harry said out loud to herself as she followed that thought to its conclusion.

Occlumency.

Oh, seven hells.

She could just picture Snape's greasy hair, his sneer as he pulled out of her head, that sense of vertigo as she was shoved out of her own unwillingly imparted memories. The humiliation and burning as the Uncle Vernon in her memories loomed over her in the hallway.

Harry kind of wanted to cry.

No, it was worse than that, there wasn't even a Snape here. For all that she hated every second of it, for all that it ended in disaster, he'd at least been there to teach her. Harry couldn't learn from anyone here, because they'd find out the truth about everything, about the time travel and future, so she'd have to teach herself.

Harry would have to teach herself occlumency.

She might as well start digging her own grave.

* * *

He couldn't say it.

No, he did say it, but he couldn't truly say it.

He'd let the truth spill out but hadn't dared pressed, hadn't dared clarify, because he was that much of a coward. Too afraid of the answer he was so certain he'd hear.

He moodily pushed his eggs at breakfast, too exhausted and miserable to be enthused by the prospect of eating. Harry was having no such issues, true, she seemed unusually lost in thought, but she was already on her third plate, looking like she hadn't eaten anything since she'd left on the Hogwarts Express.

Who knew, perhaps she hadn't, she'd been ominously vague about what she'd been up to for the past few days. He'd been too cowardly to get an answer out of her regarding that either, too afraid she'd say she was visiting her family, or else hunting down a branch which would of course bring up—

Well, Tom supposed the real question was, in the worst scenario, what was he going to do?

She couldn't be a twin sister, couldn't be younger either, not with his mother dead on the front door of Wool's. She could be a half-sister, that could explain why they looked so different from each other, she also could be older he supposed.

Say she was one of those, a sibling, what was he going to do?

He'd never thought about having siblings before. It'd seemed so natural that it was him and him alone out there. His father, sure, he thought of him all the time but not a wayward brother or sister somewhere out there in Great Britain.

He wasn't sure he liked the idea though he supposed he could grow used to it.

Things didn't have to change, in fact, nothing needed to change. They could still be friends, still become closer than they were, he just would have to frame her in his mind differently and accept that some futures simply could not happen. He'd have to—

No, he didn't know they were related, she'd looked at him in his room as if he was mad. She'd had no issue staying in his bed, though she'd been too tired to protest either. Still, she looked as if she had no idea what he was talking about, what Tom Riddle's family could possibly mean to her.

Except she'd still gotten into the chamber, killed a basilisk, wasn't a muggleborn by the name of Evans, and had always been wary of him long before he even noticed her.

Well, shit.

"So, this family thing," Harry said, having finally slown down to a humane eating pace.

Tom's head lifted so fast he thought he might have whiplash, "Yes?"

"Is that all you've been up to?" Harry asked, the tone one used for polite but meaningless conversation. Either she was a much better actress than he ever gave her credit for or she really thought his search for his family had nothing to do with her.

"Well, most of it," Tom said, rubbing a hand through his hair again and wondering if these bouts of false hope were going to give him a heart attack, "With a last name like Riddle it's… difficult. I've also been looking back into the mind arts."

This got her attention, she dropped her fork, eyes meeting his directly, "You mean like occlumency?"

"Yes," Tom said slowly, "I figured it was about time I became proficient."

He'd always been something of a natural, especially when it came to legillimancy, but the looming question of his ancestry and Harry's relation to it had prompted him to sit down and take the time to become dangerous rather than merely competent.

Harry didn't have to know that last bit.

"You mean you're teaching yourself?" Harry asked, unusually insistent, "You can do that?"

"Well, yes," he said uncertainly, leaning back slightly as she leaned forward, "Though it is notoriously difficult."

Tom, of course, had never been afraid of difficulty or hard work. Not when the reward was most certainly worth it. Plus, he'd never trust anyone enough to seek out a master and give them free access to his head.

"How?" Harry asked.

"How?" Tom dumbly repeated, "Are you… Are you asking me to teach you occlumency?"

She paled, and furiously shook her head, "No, absolutely not, just… How do I teach myself?"

This last was said weakly, a reluctant admission her own part, and she didn't have to say it for him to realize she had no idea where to start. He doubted she even knew what occlumency, at its heart, truly was.

More, he couldn't help but ask with narrowed eyes, "Why do you need it?"

"Why do you need it?" she retorted with a challenging glint in her eyes.

Touché.

Well, on the one hand, teaching Harry how to be a proficient occlumens would only make his job harder. He couldn't exactly fish out Harry's secrets if he was also teaching her how to keep those secrets guarded.

On the other hand, Harry didn't seem to realize what she was doing here. She was willingly asking for not only his help, but his time. She'd grown comfortable enough with him, even after he'd pointed out his suspicions, to ask this of him. With this he'd see her every day, not inside her head, but passing on what he knew.

If he said no then she'd drift back into her own world, looking for her own answers. Worse, when term started, she'd run off to Alphard Black who while perhaps not an occlumens himself would certainly have the resources to aid her. Tom would be pouring kerosene onto that fire and would have no one to blame but himself.

More, if he blew this off, he may never get this chance again.

So, he just smiled, "When would you like to start?"

After all, Harry didn't seem like she had the disposition of someone naturally talented in the mind arts. He'd probably be fine.

Harry opened her mouth to give some response but then, glancing over Tom's head, closed it. Turning Tom caught sight of the unholy trinity: Headmaster Dumbledore, Deputy Headmaster Dumbledore, and Slytherin head of House Slughorn approaching the Slytherin table.

They couldn't have waited five seconds?

"Shit," Harry whispered, rubbing at her forehead and looking down at the table in despair, echoing Tom's sentiments exactly.

"Miss Evans," Dippet said with that overly polite smile on his face, "You look as if you're feeling better."

"Peachy," Harry said, "I mean, I'm feeling much better, sir. Is there something I can—"

"The wards, Miss Evans," Dumbledore cut in, not in the mood for chit chat apparently, not even bothering with that paternal façade he so often liked to wear.

"Right," Harry cringed, fingers tapping restlessly on the table, "I'm sorry about that, I really am, but I didn't have time to exactly aim for the gate."

"That's fine, my girl," Slughorn said, as if he'd always referred to Harry as 'my girl' instead of 'oh that poor girl', "We just want to know how you did it."

"Well, why might be nice too," Dumbledore added drily, giving Slughorn a look, one that said very clearly that he knew exactly why Horace Slughorn was loitering about on what really should have been business for the headmaster and deputy.

"Well," Harry said, pausing for a second, and then said, "I was in a pretty bad spot, chased by some, um, bad people and I had to apparate right that second so… I did."

She finished this with a smile as if that would somehow bolster that truly lackluster explanation. It'd been better, Tom couldn't help but think, when she'd stuck with a solid 'I have no idea'.

"You're only fifteen," Dippet said, glancing at Dumbledore as if for support, "You can't have your license—"

"Oh, no, I don't have a license, never learned how either," Harry cut in, smiling cutely before she ended with the real killer, "I've never actually apparated before."

No one quite knew how to take that either. Tom, in fact, wasn't quite sure how to take that. It hadn't… It hadn't really looked like apparition, whatever she'd done, more that she'd condensed time and space and somehow cut through, but that still wasn't what he'd expected to hear.

"And the stag and man were—"

"My patronus," Harry cut in, as if this was a perfectly reasonable explanation, "Well, the stag was my patronus, the glowing guy was just—Well, he's some guy."

Just some guy.

Tom had barely had a chance to think about him, about Harry's horrified expression as he'd dissolved back into light. Somehow, it'd completely slipped Tom's mind, which truly was saying something.

"Miss Evans, given the stability of Hogwarts' wards are at stake, in a time of war no less," Dumbledore started, fixing Harry with a stern and uncompromising look, "Would you mind a demonstration?"

Harry looked as if she very much minded, and in any other situation she might say as much, but even Harry wasn't dense enough to blow off the headmaster directly. Well, it looked like Tom wasn't going to be studying legilimency this morning after all.

* * *

Occasionally Tom would drift to the forefront of Harry's mind and memories. Rather than lurk in the depths of her subconscious, amidst old childhood memories and half-forgotten copies of Tom Riddle's knowledge, he'd sit at the very edge and look out at the world with her.

It was something like being inside a pensive. He didn't look out through Harry's eyes but instead saw her as she both saw herself and the world around her. As a result, the empty quidditch pitch was larger than it should have been, Dumbledore, Dippet, Slughorn, and his younger self seated further away, as if they were up in the stands rather than on a bench beside the field.

Harry was smaller, ganglier, and while the glasses were still gone it felt as if they were somehow displaced. Like she still should have been hiding behind them as she looked at her unimpressed audience.

And Tom, for his own part, wayward memory that he was, sat as an unnoticed spirit next to his younger self.

"Alright," Harry said loudly, a bit too loudly to the staff watching, "Now, I might not actually be able to do this a second time. It wasn't exactly easy the first time and I had tried and failed a whole lot of times before that. Just so you know."

She then blew out, gearing herself up, trying to find that desperate concentration that had seen her through before. The perfect balance between serenity and utter panic.

Tom allowed his attention to wander, drifting over the younger, wary, Dumbledore, the far less memorable Dippet, Slughorn, and finally his younger self. Harry couldn't see it, didn't know it, but Tom Riddle had already changed dramatically.

This was not the sixteen-year-old Tom Riddle that he himself had once been, such an angry, bitter, thing that in his fifth year had allowed his hatred and madness to consume him. The anger was there yes, as was the bitterness, but there was a new honesty that he was growing into. More, there was hope, especially when he looked at Harry, this Tom had hope for his future…

Perhaps he should tell her that, warn her that the future was falling further and further away, might already be unreachable. However, she knew already, or some part of her did. It was why she had this new scheme, this new goal to try and reach out to him, to master occlumency without Snape's help. It was a distraction, a temporary goal, to waylay the inevitable realization.

No, Harry knew, it was accepting it that would be the problem.

"How about the patronus first, Miss Evans?" this was Slughorn, dark eyes shining like beetles, as he eagerly tried to gauge just how much potential Miss Harry Evans had. She already had proved an asset as far as quidditch, now with the taste of raw power in his mouth, Slughorn was practically salivating.

She didn't know it, but she'd just bought herself a seat at every slug club until she graduated. She'd also doubtlessly bought herself even more tutoring via Tom Riddle, as Slughorn sought to turn Harry Evans into a pureblood lady worthy of the raw power she possessed.

The trouble was, would Harry be able to perform in front of a live studio audience without the threat of death hanging over her head? Harry usually didn't bring out the big guns unless she had to. She preferred to cozily sit just above average in terms of ability, not enough to earn truly horrendous grades, but not enough to gain her throngs of admirers either.

She'd done everything in her power to be nothing like the ambitious Tom Riddle.

"Patronus?" Harry asked, rubbing the back of her head, "Is that really necessary?"

"A fully corporeal patronus is unusual at your age," Dumbledore reluctantly admitted, "I heard about your and Mr. Riddle's project, I wish I had been there to see it."

He said this with all the enthusiasm as a man watching his teeth be pulled out with a pair of plyers. Judging by his younger self's disgusted expression, the boy agreed with him. Dumbledore had never, in his life, ever wished to see anything Tom Riddle was any part of.

Harry grinned, standing taller and brighter, a patronus she could certainly do.

Her wand flicked out and she effortlessly went through the motions, shouting the spell, and then…

Then it was like being sucked through a tube, his shoulder aching where it was shot, and only catching his breath when he was on the other side. The other side, being the other end of Harry's wand.

He looked around desperately, at the sky, the stands, at the sudden looming presence of reality without the shield of Harry's mind. Then he looked at her, she looked back at him, eyes wide and mouth hanging open.

"Shit!"

Then he was back through the tube, wheezing as he hit the other end, cursing as he clutched at his shoulder and tried to recapture his bearings. God, it felt like he'd just gone and reopened the wound, just when it had finally closed too…

"Um, well, that was new," Harry said slowly, "That doesn't usually happen. It's usually the stag, I mean, just the stag."

With a groan Tom straightened, looked around at the others to see how they were taking it. Not well.

Slughorn quietly, leaned towards Dumbledore and asked, "Have you ever seen one like that?"

"No," Dumbledore said very softly, "Never two entities, and certainly never in the shape of a human being…"

Then, louder, Dumbledore asked, "Miss Evans, if you might demonstrate again?"

Harry shifted from foot to foot, nervous and awkward, and finally said, "No, I think I'm good for now."

Oh Harry.

"Miss Evans," Dippet said, that polite edge fading as the day wore on, "Remember this is the safety of the school we're discussing."

"My patronus has nothing to do with the safety of Hogwarts," Harry said, "I mean, it didn't apparate for me."

"Miss Evans," Dippet said, all politeness finally gone, "If you do not I will have no choice but to suspend you come the start of term. These are dark times, girl, and we can't be too cautious."

"Grindelwald," Dumbledore added somberly, "Has a far reach, even as far as Britain, and we cannot be too careful."

The war… He could see the younger Tom's head lift, look at Dumbledore, some realization growing in his head. The wizarding war, as opposed to World War II, had felt very far removed from Tom when he was in Hogwarts. It had never touched British soil directly, had stalled in France for years, until Dumbledore out of nowhere had won the duel that had won the war.

This was likely one of the first times Tom Riddle had heard it brought up like this.

As if Gellert Grindelwald was a real and credible threat to the Hogwarts population.

Harry gritted her teeth, nodded, and looking far more somber cast the spell again. Tom grit his teeth in turn, clutched his shoulder, and tried not to shudder visibly when he reached the other end.

Well, he was glowing again, just as he had underground and accompanied by Harry's stag. Otherwise, though he didn't have a mirror, he looked the same. Same hands, same legs, same torso, so he was willing to bet he was still wearing Tom's face.

Though hopefully he was glowing a little too brightly to make out distinct features like that.

A glance at the bench and they were all leaning in, eyes wide and filled with light, but no hint of recognition on any of their faces. Good, it seemed his cover, Harry's cover, wasn't entirely blown out of the water yet.

Harry lifted her left hand in a small wave, and said quietly enough that their audience couldn't hear, "Hello."

He lifted his own in turn, unable to stop from smiling, and just as softly said, "Hello, Harry."

"So…" Harry started, then glanced at the bench, "You think this is good enough for them?"

"Likely not," Harry's inability to subtle had always gotten into trouble. Certainly, with Slughorn, there'd be no end after this.

"Well, great," she muttered to herself then added, "Fancy seeing you here. You think this is a regular thing now?"

"Perhaps," he wouldn't know, this after all had never happened before, but Harry also hadn't known he existed before and that could make all the difference. She'd accepted the idea of him, the possibility of him, and that might have been enough to make this a reality.

"Well, what should I do now?" she asked, trying to be cavalier, but looking so very desperate.

That was the question, wasn't it? He still smiled though, and noted quietly, "Well, the way I see it, there's nowhere else to go but up. Might as well give them what they came for."

Harry nodded, and with a swish of her wand, broke the spell and dismissed Tom back into her head. He gave a great, shuddering, sigh of relief, finally. Hopefully they wouldn't make him do that any time soon, or at least until his shoulder finally stopped killing him.

Harry took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and Tom could feel the power gathering around her and in her. It knocked against the wards, searching for the holes that weren't there, but Tom could tell it wasn't enough to get her through.

With a great exhale she fell backwards onto the grass, thrown back by the wards, groaning quietly as she tried to pick herself up.

If she couldn't do it, didn't do it, would that be better or worse?

The moment she'd made her grand entrance they were damned. Fail now and they'd decide it was a fluke or else believe she was hiding her abilities. Knowing Dumbledore, he could conclude she was some sort of spy for Grindelwald, and that was something Tom did not want them having to deal with.

More, if she succeeded, then she offered them bait, took a step forward to solidify her place in this world.

He knew Harry wanted to go back, no matter how many breaks she took, her heart still longed to return home. The doorway to the future though kept growing smaller and smaller with every passing day. It could, in fact, already be gone. This Tom Riddle was slowly but surely becoming a man who would not become Voldemort, not naturally, and already he couldn't go back to the boy he was. The future could already be beyond their reach, not if it existed in this timeline.

And if they went back…

It wasn't his place to dictate Harry's future, to have any opinions on it, he was just a lowly tenant but if they went back then he knew where this story would end.

Harry would be made to realize exactly what lived inside her and would be forced to destroy herself in order to destroy him. Dumbledore would see nothing less, would prime that pump until Harry was more than ready to do it herself, or if not her then someone else, perhaps even one of her friends.

The only way to stop it would be to remove Dumbledore, perhaps even Severus Snape, from the game board entirely before they could move against Harry. Which, of course, would condemn the future to an immortal Voldemort with no humanity left inside of him.

There was no future for Harry Potter past 1996; not that Tom could see.

If she broke through the wards again, with Slughorn and maybe even Dumbledore as witnesses, then she would forever mark herself as someone with tremendous and unheard of talent. She could have a career, a life here, and while she'd never be "just Harry" she would never be poor and would be far more than the girl-who-lived living on fame for an incident she didn't even remember.

His eyes drifted to his younger self, the boy enraptured as he watched Harry, concentrating on her the way he only concentrated on his studies and obsessions. More, Tom was beginning to believe she could end Voldemort before he started. The seeds were already planted, though Harry refused to see them, and with the right nourishment they could bloom.

But if Harry stayed, if she gave up on the future, the guilt might just destroy her.

"What should we do?" Tom asked, not anyone present, but instead the deeper core of Harry Potter.

The girl appeared, eleven years old and in glasses, adjusting them as she looked up at Tom, ignoring her other, present, self trying yet again to apparate.

"We have to stay," the girl said, as if there wasn't any room for doubt, which for Harry at such a deep level there was none. Rationalization happened at higher level of consciousness, as did moral quandries, and second guessing. This girl represented how Harry truly felt, the good, the bad, and the ugly.

"Do you want to stay?" he asked and here she did look away from him, stared across at her other self, a frown on her face.

"I think I'm not afraid so much for my friends, for the future, but afraid that I'm not afraid. It feels like I'm forcing myself to feel and think the way I am, to keep pretending everything's the same, when I knew at the very beginning it wasn't. 1996 doesn't exist anymore."

"It could," Tom said, though it was a pointless notion, a Harry at this depth was also not one who could change her mind so easily.

"I already decided with the basilisk," she said instead, "I just didn't want to admit it."

Finally, she looked back at him, her eyes hidden behind the reflective lenses, "And I can't go back the way I am now, not knowing that you're here with me."

He felt the quidditch pitch bleed away, the spectators with it, as Tom and the eleven-year-old Harry sunk deeper into her mind. Into the pit of Tom's fears and secrets that he had thought Harry had never guessed at.

It was a dark, formless, room made of twisting shadows reaching out for any hint of light. Something that dragged, grabbed, and suffocated as it pulled you down until you forgot what light even looked like.

His voice shaking, he asked, "Does she know?"

"No," the girl said, without malice or pity, "But she's starting to understand the implications."

Folding her small, pale, hands together the younger, deeper, Harry explained, "Everything I know, Tom Riddle knows. If Tom Riddle knows, then Voldemort might know. If Harry Potter returns to the future, she is a Death Eater spy."

He moved closer to her, placed a hands on both her arms, and insisted, "I have never willingly sent information to him! I will never willingly cooperate with him or tell him anything! You know this—"

"Down here, I know it," the girl reminded him, "Up there, I don't. I need to figure it out, I need time and space, I don't have either in 1996."

The girl took off the glasses, looked up at Tom with those unnerving green eyes, "And I have to realize, accept, that I might never go home."

For a moment neither of them said anything, just looked at each other, waiting for the other to speak first. Slowly, he let go of her arms, moved back a step from her. They were agreed, him and Harry, in her heart of hearts, were agreed in this.

For now, Harry wanted to stay, was trying to accept staying. So, for now, he would work with that.

"In that case, apparate."

"In front of Dumbledore?" the subconscious Harry asked dubiously as she perched her glasses back on her nose, "I thought you hated him."

"Oh, I do, he can't be helped, and maybe in this timeline he'll choose to help," Tom tried and failed to smile, "Dumbledore, after all, does prefer not to kill off his pawns when he can help it."

Harry looked unconvinced, far more receptive to Tom's wariness of Dumbledore than the conscious Harry ever would be, and Tom moved on, "Slughorn though, we very much want to impress Slughorn, and do it as soon as we can."

Harry gave a small hum, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, "One does not simply open the door."

"Perhaps," he said, "But we can't rely on being the girl-who-lived anymore, not her money, her fame, or her lineage. This is a cold world we've entered, Harry, and to get anywhere on our own two feet, we must be extraordinary."

"No matter what's on the other side?" Harry asked and he paused. Now there was a dangerous statement, one that needed to be thought over, the way he'd been thinking about that door for almost ten years.

"It doesn't have to open," he relented, "It just has to leak."

Harry disappeared, Tom found himself once again on the quidditch pitch, just in time to hear the loud and deafening crack as Harry Evans, mudblood with no home and no name worth repeating, just apparated through the Hogwarts wards.

* * *

 **Author's Note: Tom and Harry's ability to miscommunicate, on all levels, brings me great joy.**

 **Thanks to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


	20. Chapter 20

_"_ _Had my dream again where I'm making love, and the Olympic judges are watching. I nailed the compulsories, so this is it, the finals. I got a 9.8 from the Canadians, a perfect 10 from the Americans, and my mother, disguised as an East German judge, game me a 5.6. Must have been the dismount."_

\- When Harry Met Sally

* * *

 _December, 1942_

* * *

Harry wasn't sure why her life kept getting weirder. In fact, she couldn't really say it had, it was hard to top the whole fairy adventure after all. That said, something about the present moment felt…

Well, let's just say Harry hadn't seen this one coming.

After her miraculous repeat performance (which had been surprisingly easy a second time) they'd all just stared at her in shock. There'd been no clapping, no exclamations, just a dead awkward silence from Harry's paltry audience of Dippet, Dumbledore, Slughorn, and Riddle.

She'd even held out her hands afterwards, wiggled her fingers in the typical jazz hand pose, and said "Ta da!" to try and lighten the mood. That just seemed to have made it worse.

Finally, Slughorn had weakly asked, "Miss Evans, could you—Could you please do it again?"

So, Harry had ended up apparating on Hogwarts grounds a third, anticlimactic, time. Really, after doing it, she wondered what the big deal about any of it was. Sure, it hadn't been easy the first time, but the more she practiced the less she even noticed the wards. The apparating part felt harder than the wards part and even that was becoming surprisingly easy.

Harry was starting to suspect that all this magic that people said was impossible or difficult, like apparating in Hogwarts or casting a corporeal patronus, was just people convincing themselves it was hard.

After all, it wasn't like Harry was a genius or anything and she'd gotten the hang of it pretty quickly.

Regardless, after the third time, they'd all just sat there talking up there with one another while Harry had stood there. They seemed to have forgotten entirely about her and Tom for that matter as they muttered avidly amongst themselves.

As for Tom, well, he looked like he wasn't even on the planet anymore. Apparently, all Harry had to do to defeat him was shock him into submission. If only she'd known that a few years earlier.

Eventually Harry had just kind of left them to it and headed off to the library to start on that whole mind arts thing. Well, that and to look up what the hell had happened to her patronus. She'd really liked that spell, it was by far her best one and she'd worked really hard for it, and now like everything else in her life it was ruined by Tom Riddle and his stupid beautiful face.

She'd never be able to use it again in public!

It was as if…

As if everything was spiraling out of Harry's control without her notice. In small, little, ways that stemmed from some source she couldn't find. It felt like she was running out of time again even though she had all the time in the world.

Which made it just great that she found absolutely nothing in the library. Not that Harry was Hermione, or anything, but she'd learned her way around the shelves in the first half of 1942 out of necessity and she knew enough to know that whatever she was looking for wasn't here.

Nothing on the patronus, or at least, nothing obvious. That was probably hidden in some, dense, theoretical magic book written two centuries ago by some French bloke.

As for the mind arts, Harry had thought that would be more obvious, but the best she could find was some really weird book called, "The Unconscious Mind and its Magic". It sounded like a great title, but skimming a few chapters was really just about sex. It detailed how everybody secretly wanted sex all the time, how whenever they looked at a snake they thought of a penis, and how everybody wanted to bang their parents.

Somehow, none of that had come up in her occlumency lessons with Snape.

At least, she really hoped they hadn't somehow, subtly, come up in her occlumency lessons with Snape.

She was suddenly very glad she'd unintentionally cut those off early.

Which left her doomed enough to have to really accept help from Tom Riddle, the 1942 version. Well, she supposed she could just summon the patronus version and just talk to him in the Room of Requirement or something but…

But he was in her head, no matter how she looked at it that was true. She had to put some sort of wall between them or have a way to secretly find out just what he knew about her, how much he could find out in there, and how much she could actually trust something like him. Conversations weren't enough for that, she'd need occlumency if not legillimency.

Which meant, of course, that Harry was doomed.

And that brought her to this morning, where, instead of getting a chance to ask Tom to please live up to his promise and help a poor brother out, she'd been summoned by Dumbledore to his office as soon as she'd set foot in the Great Hall.

Which brought her to the weirdness of this morning.

She'd never been to his office before, at least, not the one in the past. It wasn't quite as cluttered as the version from 1996 but it was well on its way. Several of the mysterious ticking items on his desk were missing, as was Fawkes for that matter, and Harry didn't spot a pensive but there were still bits and bobs here and there designed to attract the wandering eye.

It was like… Like Albus Dumbledore hadn't quite grown into himself yet but was more than on his way.

She frowned to herself at that thought, because while the room looked similar, and even the man and his eye watering clothing was similar, it wasn't the same. The atmosphere was nothing warm or genial, instead it was quiet, nerve wracking, and tense.

It hadn't been like this before.

Albus Dumbledore, ever since her first year, had always felt like the grandfather she'd never had. He connected her to the memory of her parents, passed on their gifts to her and advised her on how to let them go in the Mirror of Erised, he was there after Quirrell, the Chamber of Secrets, and had helped her save Sirius with Hermione's then secret time turner.

He'd always been there, unless he couldn't help it, and was a pillar of support, advice, and one of the few people in Harry's life that she could absolutely trust. He'd done so much for her.

Only recently, in the past year or so when Voldemort really returned, had things between them started changing.

That whole summer, after Cedric had died, he'd made her think that all her friends had abandoned and forgotten her. Not a single letter from Ron or Hermione, not even a phone call from Hermione, or a message from Sirius. Harry had spent the summer wallowing in the desperate guilt of Cedric's death and terror of Voldemort's return and if it wasn't for Umbridge's bloody dementors she wouldn't have heard anything at all.

And not one of them had stood up to him, not one of them had said, "Hey, maybe we should check on Harry, send someone competent to make sure her bloody cousin doesn't get eaten by dementors". Instead each and every one of them had listened, had contented themselves with bloody Potter Watch, and—

And at the trial he'd barely looked at her. Harry had faced expulsion, Dumbledore presiding as Supreme Mugwump, and he'd looked at her like she was less than dirt. She'd felt… So ashamed, even though she'd done everything she could, even though she'd known saving Dudley was the right thing to do she felt ashamed as she stood there and wondered in terror if her wand was going to be snapped right then and there.

Later, he'd told her, that Harry had been in a very bad position. Fudge wanted to discredit her badly, was willing to risk the expulsion of the girl-who-lived to get what he wanted, and Dumbledore could not be seen as doing her any favors or looking in any way sympathetic. It'd just have made everything that much worse for Harry.

She got that, she did, and it'd all worked out. She returned to the Burrow, still bound for Hogwarts after all, had a sigh of relief and a small "get out of jail free" celebration with the Weasleys. Still, that night, she'd stayed up the whole time sobbing under a quietus, not even sure why she was crying except that she couldn't seem to do anything else.

Then at Hogwarts, there'd been Umbridge, and she knew Dumbledore couldn't do anything about her. She knew that. More, she knew it was her own damn fault with her stupid clubs and their stupid names that he'd gotten arrested but—

He never told her anything. He didn't listen, and she knew he was busy, she knew she hadn't really talked to him all that much in past years no matter what it felt like, but it felt like he was always out of reach when she needed him there.

It felt like expectations just kept piling higher and higher on her shoulders and he was never there.

And here in the past, even without the girl-who-lived, without Voldemort, without the secrets, the lies, the pretenses, and the higher-level strategies Harry didn't understand it felt like all of that was magnified.

There was an insurmountable wall between Harry Lily Potter and Albus Dumbledore.

"Miss Evans," he finally said with a small, barely perceptible, sigh.

Harry started, "Yes?"

Yes, god that was awkward. There it was, he even sighed again, and now he was staring at her. Dumbledore… Harry had always thought he found her funny, maybe in that stupid but charming way. She'd never felt…

Well, it wasn't until she came here that she felt like dirt in front of him.

Finally, he noted, "Are you aware of your standing in my course?"

Well, that wasn't what Harry had expected. She blinked, blinked again, "Um, I think?"

Then she had a sudden, horrifying, thought, "Wait a minute, I'm not failing Transfiguration, am I?!"

Potions she could accept, she'd had the world's most vindictive professor for ages and she'd never been exactly good at it. History of Magic, same thing, it was so boring she'd slept through nearly every class since she was eleven. Only Hermione had ever actually bothered to study it. Plus, in 1996 when Binns was dead, it never really mattered as Binns was too dead to correctly grade the exam so if Harry just wrote "goblins" enough times she usually walked out with at least an E.

Transfiguration though, sure Harry had never exactly been Hermione, but dammit she wasn't bad at it either. Aside from Defense, and maybe Charms, it was her strongest class in the Hogwarts core curriculum. If she was failing Transfiguration, the second time through, well Harry might just have to crawl into a hole, die, and just let Voldemort take over Britain already.

"No, no, nothing that drastic," Dumbledore said, and… he smiled, he actually smiled and laughed. Harry didn't know if she'd ever seen him smile or laugh around her in this time period before.

He laced his fingers together and gave her a more serious look, "Frankly, Miss Evans, you're average."

"Oh," Harry said slowly, and then flushing, "Well, you know, I didn't really expect—"

He held up a hand to stop her, "Wait for me to finish first, please."

After he was assured that she wasn't going to blather on about how Harry knew she was stupid, or if not stupid, then not exactly brilliant and more than a little lazy, he continued.

"You're above average in terms of practical results, but your essays have been poor since the start of the year. More, even in the practical realm you are outshined by a number of your peers."

Well, that wasn't exactly news. Harry didn't want to ask it, but she was starting to wonder why Professor Dumbledore had brought her up here. Well, no, she'd been wondering that since the beginning but now this seemed really pointless.

Harry wasn't sure she'd had a meeting with any professor regarding her grades or performance in any given timeframe. Even Slughorn, who'd been prompted by Tom at her abysmal Potions and History of Magic performance, had never met with her to talk about it, he'd just gossiped with Riddle.

They probably all assumed that Harry wasn't that much of an idiot and clearly knew where she stood in regard to her peers. If Harry wanted to raise her grades, then she could damn well figure out how to do it herself.

She wondered if she was supposed to thank Dumbledore for this truly earth-shattering news.

He didn't wait for her though, or clarify anything, instead he asked, "Miss Evans, why did you come to Hogwarts?"

"What?" Harry asked.

What was that supposed to mean? She wasn't even sure she understood the question. Dumbledore didn't even blink though, remained perfectly calm and steady.

"What did you hope to gain by attending a magical academy?" he expanded, "Unless I'm mistaken, you've been home schooled most of your life, why bother to come to Hogwarts for your last two years?"

Oh, shit, the home school thing.

It wasn't that Harry had forgotten all about her fake, patchy, past but she didn't put too much thought into it. Honestly, no one really asked about it after Dippet and Dumbledore had done their initial interview, and Riddle was the only one who displayed any interest in where she came from.

Harry struggled not to squirm or else sweat in her seat.

She really should have put some more thought into all of this.

"Well, to take my OWLs and NEWTs, of course," Harry said with a strained smile.

"You must realize both examinations can be taken directly at the Ministry," Dumbledore responded without missing a beat.

Goddammit.

"Really?" Harry asked weakly, she… She didn't think she'd known that. Sure, she guess it made some kind of sense, but she'd never had to think about it before.

She really should have put more thought into all of this.

Dumbledore's pensive frown grew deeper.

"Well, I guess I just always wanted to know what it was like," Harry said with a small laugh, "I'd always heard about it, always imagined how nice it would be attend with other people my age, and find a place—Well, I just always thought about it, and I'd finally gotten a chance to come so I took it."

She wasn't sure if he bought that or not. It was the closest to the truth though, that was what it had felt like at eleven. Sure, Harry had gone for the magic, but she'd gone for more than just the magic and the grandeur of it all. She'd gone for the people, the world that embraced her with open arms, and she'd stayed for the friends she'd made there.

"And what are your plans for after Hogwarts?"

Huh?

Plans, Harry had no plans.

Well, she'd had one grand plan. That was to return back to 1996 as soon as possible, but, thanks to the Tom in her brain that was on the rocks until further notice if not indefinitely. So, she guessed that made her plans figuring out what to do about him, which was what her second round of learning occlumency was supposed to be about.

If she hadn't figured any of that out by the time she graduated Hogwarts…

Well, then whatever she ended up doing should probably revolve around taking care of all of that. Except, what kind of job even was that? A curse breaker, psychotherapist, maybe some sort of exorcist?

Did wizards even have exorcists?

Harry then realized she'd just been sitting here for a full minute not answering.

Flushing, Harry blurted, "An auror! I'd like to become an auror!"

It was pretty in line with what she'd been doing for the past six years after all. If surviving Voldemort annually was any indication, then Harry should be pretty damn good at it.

Plus, thanks to the Order, she knew a few aurors now and it seemed like a good, rewarding job. Harry was always down to fight the forces of evil, more so if she got paid while doing it.

Dumbledore said nothing, gave no kind of reaction away at all, no indication if he thought this was either a great idea or the worst thing he'd ever heard in his life.

Harry laughed nervously, rubbing the back of her head, "Um, well, or maybe teaching Defense?"

She'd been pretty good at that too, what with her scores in Defense and the DA, or at least Hermione had insisted Harry was bloody good at it.

Dumbledore continued to say nothing.

Harry, trying to smile, asked weakly, "Don't I have a little more time? Shouldn't I get my OWL scores first?"

No one back in the 1990's had ever stopped to talk about Harry's future. Well, probably because like Harry they secretly wondered if she'd ever make it to the next year. No point planning that far ahead if Voldemort was just going to topple the government and gut you like a fish the next year out.

Merlin, what was she doing here again?

Finally, Dumbledore let her off the hook and started talking again, "Although Professor Merrythought plans to retire soon, it is unlikely you will obtain the Defense position."

He looked at her… It wasn't quite pity, Harry thought, but something similar.

"Despite your clear abilities and talent, you lack experience. The Defense position has traditionally gone to a weathered duelist or else an auror, never a student right out of Hogwarts, no matter how talented."

"Oh," Harry said dumbly, but he wasn't finished.

"As for an auror position," Dumbledore continued, "You will require a minimum of five NEWTs with no grade under Exceeds Expectations, including Defense, Charms, Potions, Transfiguration, and an elective of your choice. Generally, Defense is expected to be Outstanding."

"Oh," Harry repeated, a little louder, as she realized exactly what he wasn't saying aloud.

Oh, oh shit. Defense she had in the bag, she probably was okay in Charms and Transfiguration too, but Potions. That Potions score, that was, well, it was…

If Harry wasn't already sitting down, she'd probably ask to sit down right about now.

"More, because you are a woman, I am afraid you will have to prove yourself twice as competent as any man who applies."

If one could describe the noise that passed through Harry's lips right then, it was probably a gurgle of despair.

Dumbledore flicked his wand and a paper landed on his desk, another flick and it spawned another paper of the same size, one going to Harry and one to Dumbledore. Glancing down it looked like her current schedule with all her different courses listed.

"Right now, you more than meet the mark in Defense, but you're scraping by in Transfiguration, utterly floundering in History and Potions, and you seem to have taken it upon yourself to take the easiest possible electives you could find."

Well, he wasn't pulling any punches today, was he? And Herbology wasn't easy, those plants were goddamn vicious! Sure, it wasn't exactly advanced algebra, but there was skill involved, or else Neville wouldn't be so bloody good at it.

And she'd learned a lot in Care of Magical Creatures—

Strike that, she'd learned nothing in Care of Magical Creatures, but Harry couldn't just let Hagrid down like that after he'd put so much effort into finally becoming a professor. And there was some value in learning how to run away from the fiery death scorpions that Hagrid had bred for the Triwizard Tournament.

Care of Magical Creatures had had loads of real-life applications from defeating trolls to slaying basilisks.

And Divination was—

Alright, that was because Harry was stupid, lazy, and it's sounded so easy she couldn't resist. But at least Trelawney had sort of warned her about Sirius, even if she'd made it sound like she was predicting Harry's inevitable death.

Before Harry could actually say any of that though Dumbledore was already talking again, giving her a remarkably frank look, "Right now, you're too unmotivated to possibly be accepted into the auror corps."

She had no idea what to say to that.

She felt like her brain had left the castle in shock about five minutes back.

Finally, she asked, "Why am I here?"

By the look on his face he'd been waiting for her to ask that for some time, "I expect your head of house, Professor Slughorn, will have a chat with you shortly. I'll be frank, he'll likely push you to make the most of your time here now that he's smelled blood in the water, but it seems that I too have overlooked you."

"Huh?" Harry asked yet again.

"I'm afraid your mysterious appearance, and then your sorting into Slytherin, put me on guard. You see, Harry, these are troubled times and the hat doesn't lie."

"Oh, you thought—" Harry cut herself off, he thought she was a Death Eater, or something like it. From what Harry knew, not that she'd been paying too much attention, but there was a current dark lord on the continent.

He thought Harry was a spy for whoever that was, Girdle Waltz or something.

Harry laughed then, again, she had to stop doing that, "Well, what made you change your mind?"

He finally smiled again, a small, slight, thing, "I've simply gotten to know you and have seen for myself there's not a dishonest bone in your body."

"Oh," well, Harry guessed that was nice of him.

"I've decided that if you want to, if you truly wish to become an auror, I'll offer extra lessons in Transfiguration and aid you in any other subject in preparation for your auror application and exams."

Harry sat in a daze, not sure what to say for a moment. She should be over the moon right now. She'd always wanted more time from Dumbledore, more preparation on how to face Voldemort or even how to approach school. She'd hoped, when he first had mentioned occlumency, that she'd be learning from him instead of Snape.

This was everything she ever thought she'd wanted.

But…

That wasn't what came out of her mouth, "Oh, you're probably way too busy to do that for just one student. Especially if Riddle, Tom Riddle I mean, was too busy to tutor me. I can just ask Alphard for help when he gets back to school."

She hastily gathered her things, hands shaking even as she talked, "Oh, wow, it's getting kind of late, you probably have things to do. Thank you again, for everything I mean, and showing interest. I'll try harder next semester, I swear."

And before he could say anything else she was already out the door.

She wondered…

She wondered when she stopped being able to believe what Dumbledore said.

* * *

Of all the places to find Harry Evans, it was in a library.

Tom didn't know why he was surprised; he'd found her in the library often enough. If he had to give Harry a favorite haunt, this would be it, and yet it never seemed to suit her.

She always felt so very out of place here, no matter her diligence, like sitting there with her nose in a book was to fight against her own nature. Like she was here not so much out of any true enjoyment of learning but out of sheer stubbornness.

Yet, here she was, burying herself in yet another obscure and ultimately useless book. Though the topic had changed, instead of the nature of time, Harry appeared to have switched interest to the mind arts.

She was so intent on it that she didn't even seem to notice him hovering over her shoulder. Those strange, arresting, eyes were glaring down at the text, lost to the printed world and for once focused on something else.

In quiet moments like this, when she was so very still, she looked as dangerous as she undoubtedly was; something old and ancient trapped in the skin of a mere girl.

He wondered if this meant she felt more comfortable around him. She had so rarely let him see this side of her, not when he wasn't on the receiving end of those eyes instead. More, he didn't think, in the beginning, she'd ever let herself be surprised by his presence.

It was a nice thought at least.

"You know, anything that you can pull down from the shelf is utter tripe." Tom said casually right next to her ear, "Hogwarts always keeps the good stuff in the restricted section."

She flailed and let out a shriek of alarm and terror, arms casting about wildly and book slamming onto the table. She finally turned in her seat, looked at him with wide eyes and flushed cheeks, and screamed, "Don't do that!"

"Do what?" he asked, the picture of innocence even as he silently cast a silencing charm for the librarian's pleasure. Tom always made a point of staying on her good side.

"You know what!" Harry accused, eyes burning, but Tom just smiled to himself as he slid into the seat across from her.

"Besides," Tom said once he was seated, smirking at her, "I thought you'd decided to ask me for help."

"What?" Harry asked, flushing a little harder and then glanced down at the book and slammed it shut, "Oh, right, I did do that, didn't I?"

She looked as if she wanted to take it back right then and there, but, apparently Harry was aware that this wasn't something she could do by herself. Even if she'd had a knack for it or self-study she still wouldn't have the resources she needed, all of those were in the restricted section, and Tom was the only one who would help her get access.

Harry didn't say that though, instead she let out a defeated sigh, "Yeah, I guess we're doing that."

"Oh, don't look like that, it will be fun."

"Yeah, sure," Harry said with all the enthusiasm of Professor Binns. Then she looked up at him in suspicion, "You do realize you're not looking in my head, right? You're just telling me how to learn this stuff. You aren't teaching me."

"I had a feeling," Tom said, his pleasant smile not slipping in the slightest.

She didn't look mollified but at least she wasn't running away.

Despite himself, he found himself looking for something of his own features in hers. When she'd been away, it'd been all too easy to imagine in horror and piece them together. Up front, they shared things in common, but it wasn't as much as he'd feared.

Her hair was much curlier than his despite being much longer, they had similar skin tone, but her bone structure, her eyes, nearly every part of her looked different than him.

He didn't know if he was just trying to reassure himself, after all, siblings didn't always look alike but it at least dulled the panic. Though, at the same time, it made him restless. He wanted to ask, he needed to ask, he'd tried to ask and—

"What is it?" Harry asked blandly.

He sighed, "Harry, I—"

No, he didn't want to do this here.

There weren't that many students here over the holidays, and even less who would willingly loiter in the library without classes to spur them on, but there was still too much of a chance of prying eyes. A silencing charm wasn't enough, and even if no one had a reason to eavesdrop, he'd already given too much of Harry Evans away to others for free.

"Do you want to go somewhere quieter?" he asked instead.

Harry looked at him blankly, "Is it not quiet here?"

Lord, sometimes she was dense.

"Well," Tom drawled as he looked around, "It's not exactly private, and we're going to be delving into a delicate subject matter that is not necessarily… approved self-study."

That was part of it, as was the real questions he wanted to ask her where there was no easy avenue of escape, but…

Mostly, he wanted to keep her private.

Slughorn had met with him the day before, dragged Tom to his office and demanded Tom tell him everything he knew about Harry Evans. Mainly, when precisely Tom had put together what a find she was.

"It must have been rather early," Slughorn had chortled to himself, "Earlier than my party, certainly. But my boy, why didn't you simply tell me?"

Tom had smiled at the man, softly but sadly, as if he wished that he could have, "Naturally, I didn't think you would believe me, or anyone else for that matter. She is… She tries remarkably hard to be utterly unremarkable."

"And she's skittish," Tom added, lying through his teeth, "She doesn't feel comfortable with her peers, believes she doesn't fit in. Even for me, it took a remarkably long time to build her trust and—Well, my frustration at the party simply got the best of me."

In the present moment, Harry sighed as she stood and gathered her things, likely well aware of exactly where Tom wanted them to go. When one wanted uninterrupted privacy as the heir of Slytherin, then only the chamber of secrets would do.

As they walked out of the library, Tom at his usual pace and Harry shuffling in frustration and despair, he asked, "What did Dumbledore want with you anyway?"

After having the day before consumed by Slughorn's interrogation on the history of Harry Evans (and she was damn lucky she had Tom to cover for her because her backstory was a real shoddy piece of work) he'd been hoping to have more time with her this morning. Unfortunately, Dumbledore had beaten him to the punch and whisked her away before she even had a chance to sit down for breakfast.

"To talk and stuff," Harry said dully.

"I gathered that much," Tom asked and then, after a second's thought, asked, "Did he fail you in Transfiguration?"

Harry wasn't bad at Transfiguration, practically she was one of the better students in the OWL curriculum, but he could see Dumbledore being a petty enough bastard to fail her just because of the color of her tie and his personal dislike of her.

He'd never done it to Tom, but Tom could tell, the man was practically itching to give Tom a less than perfect score.

"No!" Harry responded harshly, as if this was never even a possibility, "No, he's—I don't know, he's decided I'm cool now."

Tom just about had a heart attack.

That was not what he'd been expecting to hear.

His head whipped towards her and before he could stop himself he blurted, "How the hell did you manage that?!"

Harry just shrugged, "I don't know."

"Do you know how many years I've tried to win that bastard over?!" Tom asked.

Tom had given up in his third year. He remembered the exact moment, the exact second, that he'd given up on Albus Dumbledore. It was the same second he'd given up on Armando Dippet and the wizarding world at large.

"I'm afraid it's simply not possible," Dippet had said, with that apologetic smile.

It had been 1941, the Nazis had been bombing London since that spring, London's children had been evacuated to the countryside and the orphanage along with them, and despite Tom's begging they had sent him back on the Hogwarts Express with everyone else and no place to go.

He'd realized then that his death meant nothing to Dippet or Dumbledore.

That winning over Dumbledore was a pointless exercise that he could never win. The best he could do was rub his success in Dumbledore's face as he destroyed everything that man had ever believed in.

Before then though, oh for three years, he had tried his hardest to win over that man as he had everyone else. He'd pleasantly smiled and eagerly volunteered his time and energy to wipe out the shadow of their disastrous first meeting.

But Dumbledore had already made up his mind before that. No, Dumbledore had known what he was looking at as soon as he'd finished talking to that gin-soaked whore of a matron, Mrs. Cole. Even if Tom had been a good sort, even if he didn't long for destruction and domination, even if he'd been a saint, Tom imagined that Dumbledore would loathe his existence.

And yet here was Harry Evans, winning him over just like that, just like she effortlessly and inexplicably succeeded with everything else.

He could slap her right now, he really could.

Unless, he thought suddenly, she hadn't actually won him over.

"What exactly did you talk about?" Tom asked, "And don't say 'stuff', again, Harry."

Harry sighed loudly, "I guess we talked about my career path."

"Your career path?" Tom asked with raised eyebrows.

"Yeah, he offered personal tutoring sessions to help too, but I just said I'd ask Alphard," she looked awkward while saying this, as if she wanted it to be casual, to be no big deal, but couldn't really believe it herself.

"You're not too bad in Transfiguration," Tom pointed out and Harry, again, shrugged.

"Apparently, I'm not good enough to become an auror."

She wanted to be an auror? He hadn't known that. That was… Well, it was interesting, given his own ambitions.

He supposed he shouldn't be surprised. Of course Harry wanted to run off and be an ally of justice or some such nonsense, probably the only female auror on the force in the past five years. Still, that was rather inconvenient for him and his future as Voldemort.

If they ended up living together or even just seeing each other frequently it'd be a little hard to pretend he was a budding dark lord and he didn't imagine he could woo her over to the dark side if she was neck deep in law enforcement.

He wondered if he could get her to change her mind somehow…

Then he wondered when exactly he'd started factoring Harry Evans so permanently into his own future.

Still, that was beside the point for now. Harry wouldn't appreciate him lecturing her on her career choices, at least, not yet.

Instead, with one eyebrow raised, he asked, "Do you really believe all of that?"

"What," Harry asked, "You think my grades are good enough to become an auror?"

"No," Tom said, though honestly, if she just tried a little harder or let some of that raw magical power show in her classes she'd be a shoe in, "I meant with Dumbledore. Do you really believe he likes you now?"

"Well—" Harry started but Tom cut her off.

"He hasn't changed his mind at all, in fact, he just might think worse," Tom said, shoving his hands into his pockets as he walked, "Honestly, he probably believes you're Grindelwald's agent."

"Huh?" Harry asked, "You mean the dark lord?"

Who else would Tom mean?

"The tutoring sessions, the abrupt change of heart, all of this coincidentally timed with the sudden reveal of your power. He wants to keep a close eye on you, and he wants time to figure out what you're really doing here."

Harry flailed in embarrassment, shock, and sheer disbelief, "What?! You must be—"

Tom couldn't help his grin, "Think about it, Harry. Your startlingly average grades, your bizarre and almost masculine personality, your obscure and nonsensical vocabulary, your lackluster cookie cutter origins, your mysterious appearance at the start of the year, the color of your tie despite any lack of visible Slytherin traits, all of that combined with your overwhelming magical ability that has you compared to Merlin practically makes you an international man of mystery."

Harry's mouth was hanging open, she looked as if she dearly wanted to refute him, but simply couldn't find the words.

"It's just too bad that no one seems to realize that it's your great ambition to have absolutely no ambition," Tom finished with a sigh, as if Harry truly was a hopeless cause.

He laughed at her expression, something torn between rage and comical horror, "Just remember, you're the one who didn't keep it just between the two of us. If you hadn't apparated into Hogwarts like some misplaced goddess, none of this would have happened."

They finally reached the first floor of the castle. Harry seemed to give up screaming at him to instead look out the window and onto the grounds. Not that you could see much of them tonight, everything was pitch black, as if instead of staring out windows they were staring into the bottom of a well.

Tom had always hated the cold and the dark that came with winter.

"Wow, it's so dark outside," Harry remarked, "Oh, today's the solstice, isn't it? I almost forgot about that."

"Truly, the best day of the year," Tom said drily, though he supposed there were worse days.

It was dark and cold but at least nobody went out of their way to pretend it was anything but that. Christmas and New Years on the other hand, oh, those were always supposed to be filled with joy and good cheer when all Tom wanted to do was pretend the season was over already.

Still, he found himself looking out with her, trying to make out the distant tree line of the Forbidden Forest. Not that he could, given how dark and overcast it was tonight.

Really, they were wasting time standing here and—

He blinked, he thought he saw something, but the moment he closed his eyes it was gone. Still, as he kept staring, it came back. There, just at the edge of the Forbidden Forest, was a small, bright, light.

"You know, they say the barriers between worlds are thinnest on the winter and summer solstice," Harry said.

"Is that right," he said, but he wasn't paying attention, mumbling out words just to give her a response.

He couldn't stop staring at it. It consumed his vision, the world outside the window growing brighter and brighter with the force of that one solitary light. Every though that had been in him was slipping through his fingers until nothing remained.

He found himself stepping forward, utterly entranced.

"Riddle?"

He touched the glass of the window, it rippled beneath his fingertips, and as if it was only water he stepped through to the other side.

"Tom!"

He floated until he touched the ground, and despite his slow and leisurely pace, it felt like the distance between him and the light was disappearing faster than it should have. Except, he never reached it, as he kept walking it led him further and further away, as if it never intended to be caught.

* * *

 _"_ _Expecto Patronum!"_

Tom was squeezed once again from the depths of Harry's mind and soul, through the wood and phoenix feather of her wand, and out the other side, cursing the whole way.

"Harry, please!" he said as he caught his breath, the hand of his uninjured shoulder on the stag to help push himself upright, "Lay off that spell, at least until I recover."

If she kept doing that, she was just going to keep tearing the wound open, and god only knew what would happen to him—to them—then.

He gingerly touched it with one hand, hissing in pain. Why was it that everything still hurt even when he didn't have a body? Did the soul just lovingly translate the missing physical sensations for him?

He stared then as he drew his hand back it was… There was a bright, glowing, liquid on his fingers, blood. More, staring down at his hands, his clothing, he looked too solid. As the Patronus he had been more whispy, stray bands of light held together in the translucent form of a man.

He wasn't entirely opaque, he looked as if there was a fluorescent bulb under his skin, but there was a solid shape to him that there hadn't been before.

At least, not in the mortal realm.

"The solstice," he said to himself quietly, looking out what was left of the window to his left, "The lines between reality and imagination are reaching their thinnest point."

The outline of the window remained, but the glass had disappeared, not shattered, but instead dripping down as a thin curtain of water, like an intricately designed fountain. Outside, at the very edge of the Forbidden Forest, fairy lights floated by taunting them.

"What the hell just happened?!"

He looked back down at her.

She looked furious, but not simply that, she looked afraid. Of course she did, her world had stabilized and then this had happened, the stones ripped out from under her feet in only a second.

Tom looked back out towards the window, tracing the steps of the younger, alternate, Tom Riddle. He was already out of sight, had disappeared into the forest even before Harry had cast the patronus.

"Hogwarts is built on very old and sacred ground that did not always belong to men," Tom said slowly, "The Forbidden Forest is dangerous for more than just territorial centaurs and Hagrid's abandoned beasts, it contains old magic."

"What does that mean?"

She already knew, and yet, she couldn't admit it to herself consciously. It wasn't that she was a coward, never that, but there were things your inner self acknowledged that your outer self simply could not face.

Just as Harry knew there was no 1996 for her Harry knew exactly what had just happened and why it had happened.

She just needed Tom to say it.

"Our friends the fair folk have decided to pay us a visit and have just taken Tom Marvolo Riddle as a hostage," Tom summarized, "They expect you to come for him."

They must have seen his face, somehow found his counterpart in the mortal realm. They knew Harry harbored his soul alongside hers, they knew that he and Harry were tied together by more than just the threads of fate.

He knew, he knew what she was going to do next. Her face was crumpling, but soon it would resolve itself, the grief and the guilt would be locked away and she would move into what she was most comfortable with: action.

"It's not your fault," he said quickly, "Harry, this is not your fault."

She didn't say anything, didn't note that she was the one to visit in the first place, that he had warned her it was a bad idea, that she hadn't taken care of them before she'd escaped.

But she hadn't known this would happen, except, to Harry that didn't matter.

Instead, her eyes burning, she asked, "What will happen to him?"

"You don't want to know," Tom said quietly.

"What will happen to him?" Harry hissed out, repeating herself.

Tom opened his mouth, closed it, and said, "You don't have to save him."

He placed his hands on her shoulders, "Forget the future for a moment, Harry, forget what must or must not happen to Tom Riddle. You barely escaped last time, and this time, they have something to lure you directly to them."

His hands tightened, squeezing her shoulders desperately, "If he stays there, Harry, no matter what becomes of him then he will never become Voldemort. You want to get rid of Voldemort, prevent his existence, then this might be the easiest answer you will ever find. Tom Riddle will simply disappear from this world, as if he was a dream."

Tom laughed then, unable to help the thought of how ironic it all was, this strange predicament that had stolen upon them, "And he'll get what he wants, in a sense, ages will pass him by and he will barely notice. He could exist for an eternity in their grasp."

Harry only looked at him, and asked a third time, "What will happen to him?"

Of course, of course she would insist on knowing, because she already knew too.

"Tom Riddle will cease to exist," he said, "He'll be lost to the revelry, undoubtedly become their wine-soaked slave, and will forget himself entirely."

Harry looked down at his hands, her face one of horror, and she asked, "And you're—You're okay with that?"

For a long moment Tom said nothing, there was nothing he could say, nothing he would say to damn himself further than he already had. He had come to hate many things in this strange life of his, but perhaps more than anything else, he had come to hate himself.

"There are many, Harry, who insist he never should have been born in the first place."

She took a step back, wrenched herself out of his hands, and just stared at him.

Then, "No, no, screw that and screw them! I don't—I—I'm not doing that!"

Funny, she didn't say that it was because it was her fault, because he wasn't Voldemort yet, because the timeline demanded his safe return, because any number of reasons she could guilt herself into becoming his rescuer.

No, it was a simple that she would not, could not, abandon him like that.

No matter what sacrifices it would require from her.

But then, she would be something lesser if she felt any differently.

He smiled, "No, I suppose you won't."

He looked out towards the forest, the lights beckoning them, "Well, shall we?"

She nodded and without a word stepped through the same window the young Tom Riddle had. As for Tom himself, he trailed behind, riding the stag in her wake. He didn't wish her luck nor give her advice, she didn't need any, because if she truly wanted it, he knew she would be victorious.

It was why the fair folk wanted her, after all.

Because she had the door.

* * *

 **Author's Note: This holiday season, The Carnivorous Muffin gifts you... a cliff hanger! Oh, Harry, you never do get a break do you? But hey, your life was almost back to normal.**

 **Thank you to readers and reviewers, reviews are much appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter**


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